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Using Gardner and Gagné to Effectively Design Individualized Instruction

A Master’s Project submitted to: The faculty of Evelyn T. Stone College of Professional Studies

In candidacy for the degree of Master of Arts, Training and Development

By Daniel A. Garcia

Roosevelt University
Chicago, IL

May 15, 2009

Abstract

In 1983 Howard Gardner proposed a theory of multiple intelligences that challenged the established notion of a general intelligence. This general intelligence argued Gardner was measuring logical-mathematical and linguistic types of intelligences, which were intelligences prized in the western secular world, but not accounting for other types of intelligences like musical, kinesthetic, spatial and personal intelligences. The important aspect for instructional design is that an instructional designer must take into account these different types of multiple intelligences and their derived preferred learning styles when designing instruction. Blending Gardner’s multiple intelligences theory with Gagné’s solid foundation of instructional design let’s us tailor instruction to each individual, thereby making the designed instruction optimal for learning.

Using Gardner and Gagné to Effectively Design Individualized Instruction

The theory that I’ve been most influenced by in my studies of training and development and adult learning in particular with respect to instructional design has been Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences. Multiple Intelligences (MI) theory “rejects the unitary concept of intelligence and proposes that intelligence is not limited to the capacity for rapid, logical problem-solving and convergent thinking but also includes the abilities to create products and to provide valuable services” (Shearer, 2004, p. 3).  I believe that for instructional design to be optimally effective, instruction must be designed with individual learning style preference (and multiple intelligences) taken into account.

I believe that designed instruction can be optimally effective in this way by blending Gardner’s MI theory with Gagné’s nine instructional events.  Before attempting to describe the application of both Gardner’s MI theory and Gagné’s nine instructional events to the design of instruction, it will be necessary to discuss each in some length.

Gardner v. Traditional Intelligence Theory

Gardner’s theory is quite a radical break from what has often been thought of as “traditional intelligence.” At the beginning of the 20th century it was Alfred Binet and his colleague Theodore Simon that devised the first set of intelligence tests “in order to sift out retarded children and to place other children at their appropriate grade level” (Gardner, 1983, p. 15). The tests were soon available for widespread use and the mania for evaluating people for specific purposes began. Schools, the military and industrial organizations all made use of the newly devised tests (Gardner, 1983).  Gardner theorizes that the IQ test caught on so well because they were easy to administer, easy to score, and there is a numerical end result, which reinforces a logical-mathematical bias (Gardner & Moran, 2006).

In light of discussions of multiple intelligences largely reawakened by Gardner in recent decades, most scholars within psychology and nearly all scholars outside the field, are now convinced that “enthusiasm over intelligence tests has been excessive, and that there are numerous limitations in the instruments themselves and in the uses to which they can and they should be put” (Gardner, 1983, p. 16). Generally speaking, the tasks are definitely skewed in favor of individuals in societies with schooling and particularly in favor of individuals who are accustomed to taking paper-and-pencil tests or computer-based, featuring clearly delineated answers (Gardner, 1983). Gardner (1983) notes that the tests do have predictive power for success in schooling, but relatively little predictive power outside the school context, especially when more potent factors like social and economic background have been taken into account. Gardner (1999) suggests that the traditional IQ  test having predictive powers in school is because most curriculum is designed with a logical-mathematical and linguistic bent to it, which are the areas of intelligence that general IQ (also known as “g”) measure. It stands to reason that if one has invented a concept such as “g” and then has created curriculum to support this notion of “g” that studies would then find one correlates with one another (Gardner, 1999).

Gardner (1993, xxiv) writes:

“In my view, if we are to encompass adequately the realm of human cognition, it is necessary to include a far wider and more universal set of competences than we have originally considered. And it is necessary to remain open to the possibility that many – if not most – of these competences do not lend themselves to measurement by standard verbal methods, which rely heavily on a blend of logical and linguistic abilities.”

Gardner (1983) feels that a prerequisite for a theory of multiple intelligences is that it captures a reasonable gamut of the kinds of abilities valued by human cultures.

About his theory of multiple intelligences Gardner (1983, p. 284) writes:

“And what of my use of the loaded term of intelligence? …part of the motivation for using this term is my desire to put forth a more viable model of intelligence: I seek to replace the current, largely discredited notion of intelligence as a single inherited trait (or set of traits) which can be reliably assessed through an hour-long interview or paper and pencil test.”

Gardner’s view of intelligence differs in another key way from that of the traditional notion of IQ. Gardner (1983, p. 316) writes “what recent research has shown, virtually incontrovertibly, is that whatever differences may initially appear, early intervention and consistent training can play a decisive role in determining the individual’s ultimate level of performance.” This is a key difference between traditional views of IQ and Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences, for traditional IQ has generally been thought of as almost exclusively inherited whereas Gardner places a much stronger emphasis on environment.

It is safe to conclude that in Gardner’s view, western society has embraced logical-mathematical and to a lesser degree, linguistic types of intelligence as being desirable. Where did this Western view of logical-mathematical intelligence being the supreme and most desirable intelligence come from? Gardner (1983, p. 160) states “since mathematics and science are among the proudest achievements of Western society, it is not surprising that the initial claims for “superiority” came in these areas.” Gardner (1983) reasoned that this was due to Western social scientists and perhaps particularly psychologists importing their methods of testing to foreign lands and cultures for modes of thinking similar to the Western view, and they found little evidence for them. This begat a sort of “we” are smarter than “them” view based on perceived superiority of the Western view of intelligence, which had been narrowly defined as primarily logical-mathematical.

Gardner (1983) also wrote that when these social scientists accrued evidence about thinking within the foreign culture itself, particularly those tasks that were of value to the people of that culture, that the alleged differences between “primitive” and “domesticated” minds were lessened and the “primitives” came off as superior to the investigators sometimes.

Gardner (1983, p. 160):

“When one searches in other traditional cultures for explicit evidence of the mathematician or the scientist, as we know him, there emerges little evidence that such concerns matter. A desire to build up an elaborate abstract system of mathematical relations for its own sake, or to come up with experiments to test a set of propositions about how the world works, does seem to be a concern of the Western world…”

This traditional notion of IQ has been termed by those scientists as “g” – standing for “general intelligence.” Gardner (1983) believes that apparent support for “g” comes chiefly from the fact that most tests of intelligence are paper and pencil exercises which rely heavily on linguistic and logical-mathematical abilities. Therefore, individuals strong in these two areas will perform well on tests of general intelligence, in contrast to individuals whose strengths lie elsewhere, for example, in kinesthetic or musical types of intelligences.

Proponents of “g” argue against Gardner’s claims of multiple intelligences by stating that there is no empirical support and therefore no validity for his theory (Waterhouse, 2006). However, Waterhouse (2006) also concedes that the empirical evidence for general intelligence does not exclude the possibility of MI. Furthermore, Gardner has never claimed that MI theory represents “the” definitive description of human cognitive capacities (Gardner & Moran, 2006). Instead, Gardner believes that “relatively independent yet interacting intelligences provide a better understanding of the variety and scope of human cognitive feats than do competing accounts” (Gardner & Moran, 2006, p. 227).

“It has taken a century and many millions of dollars to bring IQ testing to its current, not especially impressive (although highly reliable!) status” (Gardner & Moran, 2006, p. 229).

Gardner’s Eight Intelligences

Gardner (1983) proposed that there are actually seven distinct intelligences: linguistic and logical-mathematical intelligences (this is what we have traditionally thought of as “intelligence” in the Western world for more than 100 years), musical intelligence, kinesthetic intelligence, spatial intelligence, and interpersonal and intrapersonal intelligences (sometimes also referred to as the personal intelligences). Gardner (1999) later added an eighth intelligence: naturalistic intelligence.

Gardner (1983) believes that on comparative basis intelligences like musical, kinesthetic, spatial and the personal intelligences are less highly valued in our society compared to logical-mathematical forms of intelligence.

In the American view and perhaps in the Western view at large, musical ability is thought of as just that, ability, not a “true” intelligence. Gardner (1983) however believes that musical thinking involves its own rules and constraints and cannot simply be assimilated to linguistic or logical-mathematical thinking; thereby qualifying it as a separate intelligence, not capable of being assessed by current intelligence tests.

A similar fate has befallen spatial intelligence. One of the individuals who argued strongly for the existence and independence of spatial ability was L.L. Thurstone, the 20th century  psychometrician that is perhaps most noted for his contributions to the idea of standard deviations of IQ scores (Shearer, 2004) . Thurstone saw spatial intelligence as one of the seven primary factors of intellect. Most students of intelligence testing since Thurstone have reinforced his conclusion that there is something special about spatial ability (Shearer, 2004). Yet in our American view of intelligence, spatial intelligence is nowhere to be found. This can have profound impacts on both education and instructional design for if one is designing instruction for an individual or even group of learners that have a high intelligence in spatial ability, designing instruction in a traditional logical-mathematical or linguistic style may not be optimal.

In Gardner’s view spatial intelligence is an invaluable asset in our society especially for those pursuits such as an artist, sculptor or mathematical topologist (Gardner, 1983). Another endeavor, chess, Gardner (1983, p. 192) states “if one had to choose a single area to illustrate the centrality of the spatial intelligence, chess would suggest itself as a strong candidate. The ability to anticipate moves and their consequences seems closely tied to strong imagery.” Certainly many of us would deem chess to be an intellectual’s game. So why isn’t spatial intelligence considered more prominently in our views of general intelligence?

Other cultures have of course embraced other types of intelligences. For example, Gardner (1983, p. 207) writes “in speaking of masterful use of the body, it is natural to think of the Greeks.”  According to Gardner (1983), “the Greeks revered the beauty of the human form and through their artistic and athletic endeavors sought to find a harmony between mind and body, with the mind trained to use the body properly, and the body trained to respond to the expressive powers of the mind”(p. 207).  Gardner terms this type of intelligence bodily-kinesthetic intelligence (sometimes also just referred to as kinesthetic intelligence). Again in our modern American society and indeed throughout much of Western society, we value our athletes (who Gardner would argue are high in bodily-kinesthetic intelligence) but yet we don’t value it on the same intelligence level as we do logical-mathematical types of intelligences. Clearly, the ancient Greeks would disagree.

Gardner (1983, p. 208) points to another example of traditional IQ bias when he states “a notion that what we do with our bodies is somehow less privileged , less special, than those problem-solving routines carried out chiefly through the use of language, logic, or some other relatively abstract symbolic system.” Gardner (1983) points to the dancer, the actor and the athlete as roles in our society that highlight kinesthetic intelligence. Another profession that is often a manifestation of kinesthetic intelligence is that of the engineer (Gardner, 1983).

Of personal intelligences (intrapersonal and interpersonal) Gardner (1983) believes that Freud emphasized that a person’s interest in other individuals was justified chiefly as a better means of gaining further understanding of one’s own problems, wishes, anxieties, and of achieving one’s goals. In contrast, Gardner (1983) found the American psychologist, William James, to have a different definition, one that dealt much more with the individual’s relationship to the community. However, despite this different orientation, both psychologists embraced a sense of self and of relating to others. These are things that Gardner would deem to be personal intelligences. According to Gardner (1983) Freud emphasized a more intrapersonal view whereas James emphasized a more interpersonal view.

At its most advanced level intrapersonal knowledge allows one to “detect and to symbolize complex and highly differentiated sets of feelings, whereas interpersonal intelligence is turned outwards to other individuals” (Gardner, 1983, p. 239). The individual high in interpersonal intelligence may also be described as a “people person” – she likes to be around others, and they like to be around her. “The core capacity here is the ability to notice and make distinctions among other individuals and in particular among their moods, temperaments, motivations and intentions” (Gardner, 1983, p. 239). In an advanced form, interpersonal knowledge “permits a skilled adult to read the intentions and desires – even when these have been hidden – of many other individuals and to potentially act upon this knowledge” (Gardner, 1983, p. 239). An emerging sense of self proves to be a key element in the realm of personal intelligences. “A developed sense of self often appears as the highest achievement of human beings, a crowning capacity which supersedes and presides over other more mundane and partial forms of intelligence (Gardner, 1983, p. 242).

A note here seems in order; while some cultures value personal forms of intelligence others may feel it necessary to embrace the larger community at the hest of the development of the “self.” And rather than to seek therapy for the enlightenment or the betterment of the “self” some cultures may instead pursue acts of selflessness (Gardner, 1983). The Western notion of the solitary “hero” struggling against the hostile environment like Tom Hanks in Cast Away symbolizes our juxtaposition to many Eastern cultures that value more interpersonal forms of intelligence – like working effectively with others in a group. However, despite variations Gardner believes that every society “offers at a minimum a tacit sense of self rooted in the individual’s own personal knowledge and feelings” (Gardner, 1983, p. 275).

An important consideration of Gardner’s theories of multiple intelligences is that we all possess each of these intelligences at least to some extent with some rare exceptions, but that most of us will have a dominant intelligence or perhaps two or three.

MI Theory Applied to Education & Instructional Design

MI theory was conceived and developed by Howard Gardner as an explanation of how the mind works – not as an educational policy or panacea; however, the applications of MI theory in education have been widespread, including instructional design although probably to a lesser extent (Moran, Kornhaber & Gardner, 2006).

Gardner and his educational supporters contend that the concept of traditional IQ is insufficient to evaluate, label, and plan education programs for all students (Moran, Kornhaber & Gardner, 2006). Although at first glance it may seem that this is only an issue for education in schools, instructional designers whether it is for the design of instruction in school settings or with adult learners, often take a similar approach to both educational planning and instructional design.

Gardner (1983) makes reference to social researcher Michael Cole who has conducted a number of studies on social intelligence and has found that most apparent differences in performance across cultures can be explained by the previous different experiences by the subject. And when these differences are taken into account most apparent differences vanish.

Gardner (1993) writes “the three components that usually occur together in a modern, Western secular educational institution are: attendance at a school, acquisition of various literacies, and deployment of the scientific method” (p. 333). Gardner (1993) believes that it is through an examination of these factors and their consequences that we may better understand how other cultures that do not value these same three components as highly in their educational settings may perform poorly in settings where these three components are highly valued – in a classroom or training room, or on an intelligence test.

Gardner (1993) has concluded that in traditional non-literate societies there is a high value placed on interpersonal knowledge. For societies that harbor traditional religious schools (like some Latin American countries with their Catholic schools perhaps) there is a high value on linguistic knowledge. And in our own modern secular educational settings, the value is usually placed on logical-mathematical above all else, with some value placed on linguistic and intrapersonal intelligences.

Gardner believes that the relative importance of interpersonal intelligences has diminished in modernized society. I can only imagine what he must say now in this even more modern technology era with online education on the rise!

Gardner (1983, p. 353) “It is no wonder that individuals living in societies that had only traditional schooling exhibit severe strain when they are expected to make a rapid transition to a computer-centered educational system.”

Gardner (1983) believes that the key to success in any educational program includes a balance between the abilities and desires of the target population and the particular values, opportunities, and institutions of the society at large.

“It is a principal assumption of this study that individuals are not all alike in their cognitive potentials and their intellectual styles and that education can be more properly carried out if it is tailored to the abilities and the needs of the particular individuals involved” (Gardner, 1983, p. 385).

“The cost of attempting to treat all individuals the same, or of trying to convey knowledge to individuals in ways uncongenial to their preferred modes of learning may be great: if at all possible, it is advisable to devise methods for assessing the intellectual profiles of individuals” (Gardner, 1983, p. 385).

Here we can see clearly the connection between Gardner’s theory of MI and his application to education and to instructional design, specifically calling for individualized instruction that plays on the strengths of the individual’s dominant or preferred intelligences.

Gardner (1983) believes that intelligences can function both as subject matters in themselves and as the preferred means for teaching diverse subject matter. For example, an individual with a strong musical intelligence might best be introduced to computer programming by attempting to program a single musical piece. Or an individual with strong spatial abilities might appreciate the use of a flow chart when designing instruction for them. These are examples of how we as instructional designers can design instruction utilizing Gardner’s MI theory.

In summary, I believe that Gardner’s theory of MI is a very important concept to consider when designing instruction for adult learners. We must consider our audience and their potential preferred learning styles when designing effective instruction. It’s also best to prepare an instruction that utilizes different modes of delivery such as visual, audio, and kinesthetic preferences for example in order to reach a greater audience.

Gagné and Instructional Design

The second theory that I have chosen to reflect my personal philosophy of training and development is more specifically an instructional design philosophy – Gagné’s nine instructional events.

“Instructional Design (ID) is a systematic approach to designing instruction and instructional materials to achieve specified learning objectives” (Liu, 2008, p. 738). Gagné’s (1985) nine instructional events classify the types of learning outcomes. Gagné’s nine instructional events are: gaining attention, telling the learners the learning objectives, stimulating recall of prior learning, presenting the stimulus, providing learning guidance, eliciting performance, providing feedback, assessing performance, and enhancing retention (Gagné, 1985).

Gagné (1985, p. 3) defines learning as “a change in human disposition or capability, which can be retained, and which is not simply ascribable to the process of growth.” A key here in Gagné’s definition is that the change must be retained over some period of time in order to be considered “learning.” This concept known as “knowledge transfer” is often emphasized as the end goal of education (Gagné, 1985).

Gagné (1985) believes that the initial capabilities of the learner play an important part in determining the conditions required for subsequent learning. This is an important concept for instructional design because there needs to be planning in terms of the student’s capabilities both before and after any learning takes place. “The acquisition of knowledge is a process in which every new capability builds on a foundation established by previously learned capabilities” (Gagné, 1985, p. 26).

Gagné (1985) describes eight types of learning: signal learning, stimulus-response learning, chaining, verbal association, discrimination learning, concept learning, rule learning, and problem solving. Gagné (1985) theorizes that these types of learning build upon one another in a sort of hierarchy, and that for adult learners much of the learning that takes place are at the higher levels of learning, such as concept learning, rule learning and especially problem solving. But other “lower” types of learning such as signal learning and stimulus-response learning still take place, just less frequently and not typically in adult learning situations like in a classroom or a training environment (Gagné, 1985).

A potential roadblock to learning and retention of knowledge is forgetting, which Gagné believes is the result of what he terms “interference” (Gagné, 1985). Sometimes new information is learned that interferes with old information, which can result in forgetting. This is relevant to instructional design because the designer must be cognizant of how to arrange the conditions of learning in order to reduce potential interference (Gagné, 1985). According to Gagné (1985), one way to reduce the potential of interference is to make the subject matter highly distinctive.

Of concept learning, Gagné (1985) states “it is dependent upon internal neural processes or representation, which is served by language” (p. 51). This is akin to Gardner’s theorization of how language or linguistic intelligence as he refers to it is a symbolic representation that allows us to manipulate concepts and to think about them symbolically in countess ways (Gardner, 1983). This is a higher order type of learning in Gagné’s hierarchy which allows us to classify abstract properties, ideas and concepts, which is particularly relevant in adult learning (Gagné, 1985). These concepts have in some ways no meaning in their own right; they have meaning because of meaning that we assign to them with our language (Gardner, 1983). An example is the concept of “aunt.” The term “aunt” has no real meaning, until we classify it and define it as “an aunt is the sister of a parent.”

Gagné’s eighth type of learning, problem solving, is where the learner combines rules he has already learned into a great variety of novel high-order rules that can be applicable in other situations, in particular outside of the classroom or training environment (Gagné, 1985). According to Gagné, whenever a learner is encouraged to combine new ideas of any sort and to then independently arrive at a new idea from the resulting combination, he is considered to be solving a problem (Gagné, 1985).

Gagné (1985) describes four phases of learning: apprehending, acquisition, storage, and retrieval, of which the apprehending and acquisition phases are very pertinent to instructional design. This is because it is during these first two phases that it can be said “learning” is taking place (Gagné, 1985). The storage and retrieval phases are where remembering is taking place (Gagné, 1985). The apprehending phase is where the instructor or trainer must get the attention of the learner, so that he or she is open and responsive to acquire knowledge. Once the learner has apprehended to the instruction, the subject matter may be perceived and then coded for remembering (Gagné, 1985).

As previously stated, something is not considered to be “learned” unless it is remembered (Gagné, 1985). It is this long-term memory storage that is most relevant to education and training. Instruction must be designed in such a way as to lead to storage of the learned material for later recall and application (Gagné, 1985). This recall and application is what Gagné (1985) refers to as “transfer of learning” which is a key end goal for both instructional designers and trainers. After all, what good is material designed in instruction if it is either forgotten or never recalled and applied?

There are many potential barriers to remembering that must be addressed when designing instruction. Gagné (1985) lists three: the number of learning events that occur in a given time interval; the presence of distracting or interfering activities present following learning; and the passage of time before the application of the new knowledge is made. According to Gagné (1985) “intellectual skills” appear to be highly resistant to forgetting. The intellectual skills are those that use Gagné’s higher order learning types, such as classifying, rule using, and problem solving. In fact, it is a puzzling question to many instructional designers and educators as to just how much detailed information should be retained by a learner from a particular instruction (Gagné, 1985). Gagné (1985) argues that it is not necessary for the learner to remember everything from a lesson for transfer of learning to occur. If the learner applies his intellectual skills he can apply rules or problem solve in novel situations even if he has forgotten particular aspects of the lesson (Gagné, 1985). So it is particularly relevant for instructional designers to teach those higher order types of intellectual intelligences that will allow learners to apply this knowledge in later transfer of leaning opportunities. Gagné also refers to this as mediating learning. “The problem of curriculum planning, as well as lesson planning, then becomes one of identifying what intellectual skills are needed to mediate the learning…” (Gagné, 1985, p. 92).

According to Gagné (1985) a number of arrangements need to be made both before and after the specific event of instruction to ensure that learning occurs. One of these key factors is that of motivation. In this respect, Gagné holds a similar view to that of noted Behaviorist, B.F. Skinner. Skinner (1968) stated that the key element in motivation is to arrange the conditions of instruction so that they will be reinforcing. Gagné (1985) considers this to be part of the necessary development of instructional design – incorporating aspects of the design that will motivate learners to learn the knowledge or skill being taught.

Feedback is another important aspect of designing instruction according to Gagné. Gagné (1985) writes that regarding the usefulness of frequent feedback during the acquisition of rules, “the designers of instruction frequently point to the importance of confirming responses each step of the way” (p. 316).

To summarize, Gagné believes that many preparations need to be made for the act of learning to occur and together these preparations constitute what is known as instruction. These include: establishing motivation, controlling external stimulation, verbal (or written) directions, and providing feedback (Gagné, 1985).

According to Gagné (1985), it is logical to suppose that the initial step on deciding upon the conditions for learning is defining the learning objectives. Additionally, there needs to be a decision about the nature of the change in behavior that is sought when writing the learning objectives (Gagné, 1985). According to Gagné, the learning objectives should be comprised of the following four items: “a verb denoting an observable action, a description of the class of stimuli being responded to, a word or phrase denoting the object to be used by the learner, and a description of the potential correct responses” (Gagné, 1985, p. 327). The analysis of a topic begins with the statement of the terminal objective (Gagné, 1985). Gagné (1985) advises when designing instruction to work backwards, starting with the terminal objective and then determining and identifying the subordinate set of subtopics to be learned.

Gagné (1985) describes two kinds of transfer, lateral and vertical. Lateral transfer refers to a kind of generalizing over a broad range of situations that are at the approximate same level of complexity. Vertical transfer refers to the effects that learned capabilities at one level have on the learning of additional ones at higher levels. For optimal transfer, the application of the learned capability should be practiced over a variety of situations (Gagné, 1985).

Properly conducted assessments are an important source of feedback for the learner. In fact, in order for the next higher rule to be learned effectively, assessment is needed within topic and at the end of topic learning (Gagné, 1985). This helps to ensure that the learner can apply the learned knowledge in related or advanced topics.

Gagné and Gardner: Working Together

Gardner and Gagné share several common ideologies related to education and instructional design. A similar basic premise is that Gagné, like Gardner, believes that the factors that influence learning are largely environmental. This belief is a key tenet in programmed instruction for both Gagné and Gardner.

In designing instruction tailored to specific learners or target audiences, Gagné takes a position similar to that of Gardner. And it is here that we can see how the application of Gardner’s MI theory can be applied to designing instruction by use of the Gagné method.

Gagné argues that the typical classroom is not a place where designing instruction for each learner can possibly be done. However, it is perfectly possible for pre-designed instruction to take individual differences (like Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences) into account (Gagné, 1985). “The major possibilities of pre-designing instructional content to allow for individual differences have been exhibited, not in the classroom or in the textbook, but in programmed instruction” (Gagné, 1985, p. 331).

One can easily see a direct correlation here between what Gardner advocates in terms of designing instruction to multiple intelligences and preferred learning style and Gagné’s view of designing individualistic programmed instruction. According to Gagné, this is accomplished by determining the degree to which prerequisite capabilities are available and the degree to which learning guidance is needed (Gagné, 1985). Gagné expands upon this idea by listing what he feels are the positive advantages of pre-designed instruction; these include the selection of proper conditions, quality control which removes teaching variables such as teacher’s skills, pre-testing in order to determine if the correct set of learning conditions has been chosen correctly, and relieving the burden placed on the teacher so that she may focus on managing instruction, motivating, generalizing and assessing (Gagné, 1985).

Both Gagné and Gardner share similar views on the use of standardized tests. Whereas Gardner states that they are not adequately measuring the full range of intelligences of all individuals, Gagné claims that the tests are inadequate to assess individual learners (Gagné, 1985; Gardner, 1983). Gagné (1985) states that often these tests have been focused on how one learner is different from another when they should be focused on the extent to which each individual learner has met the learning objectives. This is what Gagné (1985) terms “criterion-referenced” outcomes. In this type of testing, scores are measured against an external standard (a criterion) rather than compared amongst other students.

Gagné (1985) feels that the lecture when used as a means for establishing conditions for learning leaves much to be desired. Instead Gagné advocates using a blended approach to both instruction and instructional design which may include a variety of instructional modes (Gagné, 1985). This would seem to blend ideally with Gardner’s views that instruction should be built in a way that is broad enough to serve various types of multiple intelligences or preferred learning styles (Gardner, 1983). “What is needed in each case is thoughtful design and management of the learning environment. This requires decisions that match the requirements of the conditions needed to present the proper stimulus for learning” (Gagné, 1985, p. 379). I conclude that Gardner would whole-heartedly agree.

References:

Gagné, R. M. (1985). The conditions of learning and theory of instruction (4th ed.). New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.

Gardner, H. (1983). Frames of mind: The theory of multiple intelligences. New York: Basic Books.

Gardner, H. (1993). Multiple intelligences: The theory in practice. New York: Basic Books.

Gardner, H. (1999). Intelligence reframed. New York: Basic Books

Gardner, H. & Moran, S. (2006). The science of multiple intelligences theory: A response to Lynn Waterhouse. Educational Psychologist, 41(4), 227-232.

Liu, G. (2008). Innovating research topics in learning technology: Where are the new blue oceans? British Journal of Educational Technology, 39(4), 738-747.

Moran, S., Kornhaber, M., & Gardner, H. (2006). Orchestrating multiple intelligences. Educational Leadership, 64(1), 22-27.

Shearer, B. (2004). Multiple intelligences theory after 20 years. Teachers College Record,106(1), 2-16.

Skinner, B. F. (1968). The technology of teaching. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.

Waterhouse, L. (2006). Multiple intelligences, the Mozart effect, and emotional intelligence: A critical review. Educational Psychologist, 41(4), 207-225.

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