Standard 2: Learning Differences
“The teacher uses understanding of individual differences and diverse cultures and communities to ensure inclusive learning environments that enable each learner to meet high standards. ”
2(g) Understands and identifies differences in approaches to learning and performance and knows how to design instruction that uses each learner’s strengths to promote growth.
2(l) Believes that all learners can achieve at high levels and persists in helping each learner reach his/her full potential
Questions that are Engaging for a Variety of Intelligences
One of my goals for student teaching was to practice asking questions that address a variety of intelligences--for example, emotional smart, nature smart, number and reasoning smart, self-smart, and body smart. Although Gardner's Nine Intelligences (learn more about that here) have been heavily critiqued recently (read about that some here), I find thinking about the different ways we engage with and learn from the world helpful in an art room.
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I learned that you have the power to make a question inviting to folks who often think in musical ways, or people who understand the world by moving their bodies around. It was difficult to remember what questions to ask when, making a list helped some. In my own classroom I would have a series of posters with questions like these on it, and I would invite students to pick one to address in both group settings and one-on-one work time.
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Moving forward I will spend more time learning how to create an more inclusive environment--one where students may feel they have a choice to share their own stories and practice understanding their peers as complex human beings with stories and experiences of their own.
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