Tales, chpts 1, 2, 5

The one thing that stood out to me as I was reading is the entry points described on pages 20-22. Whenever I try to plan, and make sure that I include all of the multiple intelligences, I find myself looking for a song to target the musical, an activity with movement for the bodily-kinesthetic, a group activity for the interpersonal, an individual activity for the intrapersonal, etc. However, the entry points given in the book--stories, experiential learning, logical-quantitative, aesthetics, and foundational (philosophical)--make more sense to me. These five entry points are a beginning to reaching students of all multiple intelligences. I know that there are other entry points, but Carreiro got me to thinking.

If my students are interested in, oh let's say elephants, then I can teach about elephants using Carreiro's five entry points and reach all eight multiple intelligences. Through a story about elephants, I could reach linguistic learners, intrapersonal learners, and naturalist learners. Through building a model of an elephant (or some other hands-on activity), I could reach the bodily-kinesthetic learners, the visual-spatial learners, the interpersonal learners (if it were a group activity), and the naturalists. Through a mathematics activity (logical-quantitative), such as comparing the weights of different elephants, I could reach logical-mathematical learners, visual-spatial learners, inter- and intrapersonal learners, and naturalists. Through dancing as though we were elephants and creating elephants (aesthetics), I could reach bodily-kinesthetic learners, visual-spatial learners, musical learners, and naturalists. Through discussions of how elephants survive, why they have long trunks, and other questions students might have (foundational), I could reach linguistic learners, inter- and intrapersonal learners, and naturalists.

I understand that I might not have listed--or thought of--all of the multiple intelligences that could be reached through each activity, but through those five lessons I could have reached all of my students several times. I find looking for an activity for each entry point to be much easier than attempting to find a different activity for each of the multiple intelligences. Why focus on one, when I can reach several?