Get Close to Opera is going to run a training week in February 2019 about Opera through #multipleintelligences #womenrights #disabilities and #immigrantinclusion.
It will take place in the beautiful UNESCO city of Matera, in the south of Italy, that will be the European Capital of Culture in 2019.
L’Albero is developing a training module that would guide the Opera and Arts Educators to create differentiated learning strategies based on Multiple Intelligences.
If you are interested in this training module, participate in #GCTO Training Week!
Learning how to learn. Multiple Intelligences at work.
One Intelligence Versus Multiple Intelligences
Learning is a complex process that occurs, not only in educational contexts, but also in professional work environments, throughout cultural experiences, and daily life. Therefore, learning is a continuous process of our life. Becoming aware of how it works, can help us to feel able to potentially learn anything.
Moreover, the learning process differs from person to person. In the 80s, Howard Gardner, a Harvard Psychologist, demonstrated the existence of a range of intelligences, challenging the common belief that there was only one intelligence.
He developed the theory of Multiple Intelligences to provide a cognitive model that sought to describe how individuals use their intelligences to solve problems.
Initially, he described seven intelligences (H. Gardner, 1983). Then, he added an eighth and discussed the possibility of a ninth (H. Gardner, 1999). They are the linguistic, logical-mathematical, visual-spatial, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, naturalistic, and existential intelligences.
“We are all able to know the world through language, logical-mathematical analysis, spatial representation, musical thinking, the use of the body to solve problems or to make things, an understanding of other individuals and an understanding of ourselves. Where individuals differ is in the strength of these intelligences and the ways in which such intelligences are invoked and combined to carry out different tasks, solve diverse problems and progress in various domains.” Hani Morgan (2014)
According to Gardner, the diversity of learning styles should impact the way people are educated. It is not possible that everybody learns the same things in the same way. Multiple Intelligences provide eight different potential pathways to learning that can be used as a mediator, to differentiate how students access the contents. When educators learn how to differentiate contents, the probability, that most learners would be included in the learning experience, rises. An inclusive context promotes a positive emotional environment for learners, thus enhancing their emotional development by making them feel comfortable, happy and more confident. This, allows learners to take risks and achieve their full potential (Leatherman & Niemeyer, 2005).
Differentiating not only ensure all learners to feel they are able to accomplish the same tasks, but they also become aware that in a group diversity means complementarity.
Since Get Get close to Opera Project’s research showed the need of increasing the knowledge about learning processes among Arts educators, L’Albero Theatre Company has designed a training that would guide them to create differentiated strategies based on Multiple Intelligences. Opera would become the background where all eight intelligences are represented.
Mariateresa Paolicelli