Applying Multiple Intelligence Theory to social good

The author of the Multiple Intelligence Theory Asks: “What does it Mean to Be Good?”

In this article Howard Gardner, the scholar who developed the Ground Breaking “Multiple Intelligence Theory,” which argued that people have at least 8 types of intelligence argues that it is not enough for people to be intelligent, what they do with that intelligence is also important. This article is helpful for parents thinking about how to help their children not only become strong thinkers, but become good citizens in the world.

He unveils “The Good Project and presents  the three main criteria for “good citizenship.”  Gardner states,” The good citizen is excellent—he or she knows the laws; is engaged—cares about what happens in the society; and, again tries to carry out duties in an ethical way.”

Excerpt: “Close to forty years after I first began to write about the concept “Multiple Intelligences,” the topic still dominates my mailbox, with questions arising each day,…. Rarely if ever does a questioner talk about the uses to which the several intelligences are to be put. For decades, I have sought to make the point that intelligences are morally and ethically neutral… From now on, when I am asked about “MI,” I will respond, “To what uses do you propose to put the intelligence or intelligences in which you are interested. And so, as we touch upon these issues, we enter a domain that my colleagues and I have been working on almost as long as the study of intelligences: what it means to be good, and what it means to do good. This is the province of what we now call The Good Project. “