Eighth Intelligence

If you are an educator, you have probably heard of Howard Gardner and his theory of Multiple Intelligence. The seven types of intelligence include: Linguistic, logical-mathematical, spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, musical, interpersonal, and intrapersonal. By identifying the various types of intelligence, schools and educators can tailor their curriculum to develop all intelligences among youth. But what about our connection to the natural world? After all, humans have been evolving for approximately 2 million years and have been able to do so largely because of an intimate knowledge and connection with our natural environment.

Gardner later identified an Eighth Intelligence: Naturalist Intelligence, which describes an awareness of the natural world. The Cottonwood Institute develops educational programs and courses that are designed to develop the Eight Intelligence among high school students. According to Professor Leslie Owen Wilson, found in the book Last Child in the Woods: Saving our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder, by Richard Louv (2005), youth with the Eighth Intelligence:

• Have keen sensory skills, including sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch.
• Readily use heightened sensory skills to notice and categorize things from the natural world.
• Like to be outside, or like outside activities like gardening, nature walks, or field trips geared toward observing nature or natural phenomena.
• Easily notice patterns from their surroundings – likes, differences, similarities, anomalies.
• Are interested in and care about animals or plants.
• Notice things in the environment others often miss.
• Create, keep, or have collections, scrapbooks, logs, or journals about natural objects – these may include written observations, drawings, pictures and photographs, or specimens.
• Are very interested, from an early age in television shows, videos, books, or objects from or about nature, science, or animals.
• Show heightened awareness of and concern for the environment and/or for endangered species.
• Easily learn characteristics, names, categorizations, and data about objects or species found in the natural world. (Louv, 2005, p. 72-73).

Question: What is your opinion of the Eighth Intelligence? Do you think this is a priority in K-12 public/private education? Why or why not?

Inspiring a Service Ethic

When I teach a Cottonwood Institute course, I typically begin by asking students what they think about volunteering and community service. Very consistently, students tell me that community service is what their parents make them do, what their school makes them do, or it involves a parole officer. Using community service as a punishment tool is not exactly the best way to inspire a service ethic among our youth.

I was inspired to give back to my community because I was greatly influenced by my parents and grandparents. I remember my brother and I being pulled down the street by my mom and dad in a Radio Flyer red wagon as we picked up trash and participated in the New Orleans Clean City Committee. My mother, Beverly Church, helped revitalize a children’s amusement park called Story Land. I remember hearing stories about how involved my grandparents were in the New Orleans community and all of the local organizations they supported.

To inspire students to become active in their communities, the Cottonwood Institute’s Community Adventure Program  makes service fun and exciting. Through the use of adventure, we teach students to comfortably and competently explore the outdoors, we teach essential camping and wilderness survival skills, and we go on overnight camping trips to practice our skills. Through the use of the outdoors, implement a technique called Service-Learning to make service fun and engaging. Students brainstorm environmental issues, choose and issue to tackle as a class, collaborate with other organizations, coordinate all the logistics, and implement an Action Project to address their issue in order to make a positive impact in the community.

Question: If you currently volunteer, work for a nonprofit organization, serve on a nonprofit board, or serve your community in any way, what specific events or people in your life helped inspire your service ethic?