Essay on Howard Gardiner's Multiple Intelligence and Bloom's Taxonomy

Introduction

Teachers across all disciplines search for ways to create meaningful learning experiences for their students in the most time effective way. Student's on the other hand, seek to demonstrate their understanding in a majority of ways which make their learning more personal, interesting, and motivational for their individual selves and the entire class as a whole. This being said, the various categories of learning have been explained and exemplified in certain theories and models. In particular, the Multiple Intelligence (MI) theory which as developed by Howard Gardner in 1983 implies that a single general ability does not dominate intelligence. Instead, intelligence is differentiated into various modalities which refer to sensory conditions (Gardner). On the other hand, unlike the Multiple Intelligence theory, Bloom's Taxonomy, which was named after Benjamin Bloom refers to an arrangement of learning objectives in an educational environment for categorizing the different levels of intellectual understanding into different sections that take place in a classroom environment. The core intent of this paper is to give an argumentative standpoint of the two theoretical ideologies and their application in the educational sector.

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Firstly, Howard Gardner's multiple intelligence theory which advocates that students in a learning environment have the possibility to learn and display knowledge in multiple ways regarding their developed strengths is said to inspire and challenge students at all levels. More fundamentally, Howard Gardner conceived intelligence as a biopsychological potential to process information in certain ways. This, in essence, helps to solve certain problems or fashion products which have a significant value in a particular community or culture (Armstrong). Besides, the multiple intelligence theory is based on the differential cognitive processing that is required for demonstrating intelligence or creative performance in different areas. When applied in a classroom setting, teachers and educators borrow from the multiple intelligence theory through understanding that each and every student has their unique profile pertaining to Multiple Intelligence. Specifically, a student may be brilliant and robust in one kind of intelligence but could also be weak in some others. Therefore, based on this context, the teacher is tasked with the role of identifying their students' different talents and to also nature them.

Besides, similar to the Multiple Intelligence theory, teachers in a classroom setting broadly utilize this theory in various ways. In particular, the different learning categories or the levels that are substantiated in Bloom's taxonomy can be considered essential for the teachers especially when it comes to assessing the students in different areas. Specifically, Bloom's taxonomy gives more options to learning other than just testing the students with written texts. According to Bloom, this theory centers on three specific domains, namely the cognitive, affective and the psychomotor domains.

When compared to the multiple intelligence theory, the Bloom's taxonomy is considered more effective especially in the 21st-century classroom setting, owing to its defined strategies for teaching. For instance, the theory encourages the use of every level of its hierarchy. More precisely, teachers employing this teaching method perceive and malign memorization as a waste of time as well as something that dumbs down the student learning. Besides, according to the theory, those educators who encourage memorization are perceived as teachers who are not doing their jobs. Nonetheless, in reality, the fluidity of a student's ability to transition across the various levels of Bloom's taxonomy is highly dependent on the broadness and the diversity of the student's schema and knowledge background. Similarly, in a classroom setting, encouraging memorization reduces the cognitive load on the students since their nature of processing information allows for quick application and recall, rather than the usual and ideal way of learning; which involves breaking the thinking process apart, finding the ideal information and the evaluating the credibility of that information (Gershon).

Conversely, proponents of Gardner's Multiple Intelligence theory contend that the theory is ideal in a classroom setting owing to the fact that the teacher is expected to be adept and experienced enough to observe each and every student in the classroom. By so doing, the teacher can identify the inclination of each student towards the various intelligence highlighted in theory and also enhance those others that are not deemed so strong. Besides, during the learning process, when a teacher observes and develops each child's strengths, they are better able to solve a majority of the problems in the specific discipline. For instance, (Gardner) argues that the application of the multiple intelligence theory enables the teacher to give better inputs to the parents, organize the classroom and most importantly, help the students to reach their highest potential. Therefore, drawing from this conceptual base, one of the greatest advantages of the multiple intelligence theory is that it enables the teacher to create an ideal environment to share much information with the parents. Besides, when parents are involved in the learning process, they feel recognized hence making them collaborators in the education as well as the learning process of their children.

Gardiner's Multiple Intelligence model is argued to be the most effective means that can be used in the Second language acquisition. In particular, second language learners, primarily develop verbal intelligence, which is a type of intelligence supported by the multiple intelligence theory, through their acquisition of vocabulary, as well as through creating a general interest in vocabulary building. Besides, Tabari and Tabari point out that in an education setting where language acquisition is an objective, more than one intelligence is covered. For instance, students who intend to learn a certain language may cover the linguistic or verbal intelligence, interpersonal, kinesthetic, and intrapersonal intelligence (Gardner). Although a majority of scholars contend that logical-mathematical intelligence, better known as spatial intelligence cannot be involved in language acquisition, Armstrong argues that this is untrue and should be perceived just as a mere myth since a person who is logically intelligent has the advantage of applying their knowledge in different contexts. This being said, teachers of a language acquisition class can apply this concept by ensuring that they develop language classes around thinking logically, categorizing, and most importantly, inferring.

To counter the argument made in favour of Gardiner's MI theory, Bloom's taxonomy is considered to have tremendous impacts in the acquisition of language. Nonetheless, while the multiple intelligence theory benefits the learners, Bloom's taxonomy which involves creating, analyzing and evaluating, merges all these aspects into the teaching and learning process and benefits the teacher most and not the learners. Precisely, the teacher's task is made a lot easier since, if students are given more opportunities to generate responses, the more their chances of improving not only their language ability but also their critical thinking and interactive skills. This, in essence, ensures that the teacher reaps more dividends since his or her work is made easier by well adept and open-minded learners.

The multiple intelligence theory centers on inspiring and challenging students at all levels. As Gardiner espoused the theory, the theory's premise advocates that students have the ability to learn and display knowledge in multiple ways and accordance with their developed strengths. In this regard, the theorist's concept purports that it is possible to display knowledge in multiple ways, meaning that there are a lot of different ways of knowing all the intelligence highlighted in theory. Besides, MI, according to Gardner, provides a viable way to differentiate instruction and hence to make it easier for the teacher to reach more students in the classroom a majority of the time. Moreover, the application of Gardner's MI while learning in the classroom dramatically increases the achievements made by most of the students.

While the two theories, the Blooms taxonomy, and the multiple intelligence theory have great significance to both the knowledge acquisition for the student and ease in teaching for the teachers, a lot of controversies arise from the cognitive styles emphasized in the two. Specifically, Bloom's taxonomy emphasized in the learning outcomes that are achieved in the cognitive domain. For instance, in this domain, students accumulate knowledge through the remembrance of the material that they had previously learned. More specifically, this means to instantly bring up the previously learned material to an individual's mind and for this reason, the student's ability to remember the learned material is considered to be the simplest category in the cognitive domain. On the other hand, the multiple intelligence theory which points to a few ways of learning and processing information in a schooling situation, refer to the cognitive style of learning as the manner in which learners organize information. For instance, the theory mentions various cognitive styles such as the reflective, and impulsive styles. In this regard, while a thoughtful student will take their time in their work to ensure that they have thoroughly understood what they are doing, an impulsive student will tend to fly through the work without really taking time to care about the possible mistakes.

In my opinion, an observation of the six categories of the cognitive domain of the Blooms taxonomy sheds light on how all the listed categories fit appropriately within the pathway of a programme of study, especially in higher education. For instance, knowledge, which falls under the first category is not only a vital part of the higher education setting, but it also applies to almost every situation. Nonetheless, Bloom's taxonomy makes use of asynchronous collaboration. In particular, creating is the highest level of Bloom's Taxonomy, and it requires that the students employ inventive thinking in their learning process. Therefore, despite the fact that a majority of the classrooms enforce what is referred to as awkward collaboration on the learners, (Gershon) argues that a collaboration of this kind can particularly stifle individual talents on students as well as their learning curiosity. This is because of these collaborations center on placing premiums on assignment compliance, socialization, and procedural knowledge.

When Multiple Intelligence and Bloom's Taxonomy are both integrated into a classroom, the person who benefits the most is the student. Particularly, teachers ought to integrate the two in a very interesting and innovative manner to enhance learning among the students and to also prompt them to think critically. In a similar regard, the teacher, on the other hand, gets a broad spectrum of knowledge, which he or she can successfully implement in any discipline to develop learners who are creative and knowledgeable individuals. Also, the combination of the two theories, especially in a classroom setting, paves the way to the student's holistic development. This, in essence, ensures that the students have the freedom to engage in higher-order thinking and problem-solving in areas that require both intellectual strength and relativeness. Thus, to achieve this, the teacher is tasked with the role of planning carefully especially when identifying the set goals, objectives and the outcomes of the lesson being...