Multiple Intelligences

1) Provide your personal definition of MI taking into consideration

current literature.
Multiple intelligences suggest that traditional views of intelligence are too
limited. Gardner suggested that all people have different kinds of
"intelligences." He proposed that there are eight intelligences, and has
suggested the possible addition of a ninth known as "existentialist
intelligence".
In order to capture the full range of abilities and talents that people possess,
Gardner suggests that people do not have just an intellectual capacity, but
have many different intelligences including musical, interpersonal, spatialvisual and linguistic intelligences.
While a person might be particularly strong in a specific area, such as
musical intelligence, they most likely possess a range of abilities. For
example, an individual might be strong in verbal, musical and naturalistic
intelligence.
In addition, Gardner claims that:
- All human beings possess all intelligences in varying amounts
- Each person has a different intellectual composition
- We can improve education by addressing the multiple intelligences of our
students
- These intelligences are located in different areas of the brain and can either
work independently or together
- These intelligences may define the human species
- Multiple intelligences can be nurtured and strengthened, or ignored and
weakened
- Each individual has nine intelligences (and maybe more to be discovered)
2) Describe how you can implement MI approach in EFL classes en
Pasto
It is difficult to apply this theory because we have to keep in mind this theory
requires a set of tools, so teacher can be creative but if the teacher has not what he
needs it is almost impossible to realize it. Also students have not developed the
same intelligences, to reinforce them it is necessary to have a wide of instruments,
time, so at schools time is so reduced making impossible to teach in an effective
didactic way.

3) What basic limitation do you find for MI?

Gardners MI has come under criticism from both psychologists and
educators. These critics argue that Gardners definition of intelligence is too
broad, and that his eight different "intelligences" simply represent talents
and personality traits.
Some people believe that the eight intelligences are not necessarily distinct,
but that they're simply subsets of a general intelligence although the
existence of general intelligence is, itself, the subject of controversy. Some
also argue that Gardner's intelligences are better understood as cognitive
styles, or ways of thinking, rather than distinct types of intelligence.
MI is not applicable activities for everybody because each person has not
developed the same number of intelligences, so teacher has to be careful at
the time of apply this theory.
MI does not distinguish that an intelligence has an implication of other
intelligences, for example if you have musical intelligence, this implicates a
group of other intelligences, so if you have not a stronger group of
intelligences you could fail in what you are going to do.
COOPERATIVE LANGUAGE LEARNING
1. What are the goals of cooperative language learning?
The goals of cooperative language learning are the following:

Foster cooperation rather than competition

Develop critical thinking skills
Reduce learners stress by creating a positive affective classroom climate
Provide a methodology that can be applied in a variety of curriculum
Develop successful leaning and communication strategies
Develop communicative competence trough socially structured interaction
activities

2. What are the advantages of using cooperative LL for Ss?

Learners in cooperative language learners have an active role

Higher ability students are in a position to be experts, leaders, models
and even teachers
Lower ability students get the benefits of having higher ability students
in their group
Positive interdependence is achieved since learners feel that they
cannot success unless everyone in the group success

Students may explain things better to another Ss than a teacher to a

class
Students learn how to teach one another and explain materials in their
own words.

3. Why is group work in cooperative LL different from regular group

work?
What makes different group work in CLL from other approaches is that in CLL groups
every single student has to participate or has a role or task, in this way each person
in the group becomes an important and essential part of the group. Groups in CLL
cannot success unless everyone in the group success!
4. How is the Ts role different from the present in traditional
methods?
The role of teachers in CLL differ considerably from traditional teacher-fronted
lessons since teachers in CLL have to create a highly structured and well organized
learning environment in the classroom by setting goals, planning and structuring
tasks, establishing the physical arrangement of the classroom, assigning roles to
students, etc. Besides, teachers in CLL are facilitators of learning, they speak less
than teacher-fronted class, provide broad questions and give few commands.

CBI
1. What is the rationale behind the development of CLIL/CBI?
Using content from other disciplines in languages courses is not a new idea.
CBI is aimed at 'the development of use-oriented second and foreign
language skills' and is 'distinguished by the concurrent learning of a specific
content and related language use skills' (Wesche, 1993). The special
contribution of Content Based Instruction (CBI) is that its not exclusively a
language program, but instead it integrates the learning of language with the
learning of some other content. Often, the content is academic subject
matter, but it can also be about other topics such as sports, music or things
in which students are interested. So, this approach can be viewed as being
neither language learning, nor subject learning, but rather a combination of
both (Marsh, 2008). In addition, CBI promotes negotiation of meaning, which

is known to enhance language acquisition (students should negotiate both

form and content) and language learning becomes more concrete rather
than abstract (as in traditional language instruction where the focus is on the
language itself)
2. Explain the theory of language behind CBI.
In CBI language is meaningful and a medium through which content is
conveyed. Culture is addressed in teaching to the extent that its present in
the content area being studied. In the theory of language we find some
assumptions about the nature of language that can be explained as:
1. Lexis is central in integrating language and content. The
acquisition of specific vocabulary is crucial in CBI courses. Language
extracted from real speech is analyzed and used as the basis for the creation
of wordlists.
2. Grammar is a resource for communicating content. In a CBI

class, grammar is acquired according to its role in expressing content. The

aim is develop language through use, so grammatical progression is based
on the demands of content.
3. Language is text and discourse-based. The focus of teaching is
how meaning and information are communicated and constructed through
texts and discourse. Students need to understand and participate in the
activities that build up the disciplines they study, activities that to a large
extent are carried out through language. Its important the centrality of
linguistic entities longer than single sentences.
4. Language use draws on integrated skills. CBI involves several
skills together, so, students might read, take notes, listen or respond orally to
things they have read or written. CBI seeks to integrate knowledge, language
and thinking skills.
3. How would you organize a lesson around CBI?
Organizing a lesson around CBI will depend in what we want to teach or ours
students learn. It is quite important choose a subject in which we can use a
lot of materials. For example, we are going to consider the case of teaching
geography. First of all, it is important to give an introduction about the topic
and give a list of important vocabulary. We should consider that in these
lessons integrating the four skills is an important goal. Then, we can ask
questions to students related with the subject. For example, lets suppose

that we are teaching cultures about different countries, we are going to ask
Juanita Do you know where people eat guinea pig? If Juanita knows the
answer, she is going to say Colombia teacher. In this way if the student does
not know the teacher replace the lack of vocabulary. Later, we can make
students listen an audio or a video related with the subject or showing
pictures. Also, we can use a map making our students locating some
countries. Another important activity is using group work and team-building
techniques. Besides, the teacher can do an activity in which students write or
read. So, we can introduce the implicit grammar for example, present simple
tense or continuous tense. Finally, it is important to do a task or organize a
homework.
4. Which CBI model is more suitable to be used in a setting like Pasto?
All models would be suitable to be used, because each one of them have
their special characteristics to teach, either with academic, specific purposes
or integrating all the skills. In a setting like Pasto it would be more suitable
the Theme Based Model because it is usually found in EFL contexts. Theme
based CBI can be taught by an EFL teacher and here, the teacher can create
a course of study designed to unlock and build on their own students'
interests and the content can be chosen from an enormous number of
diverse topics. There are textbooks that can be used for theme based CBI
classes which usually contain a variety of readings followed by vocabulary
and comprehension exercises. These can then be supplemented with
additional information from the Internet, newspapers and other sources. It's
possible to create some really interesting classroom materials as long as the
need for comprehensibility is not forgotten.
Lexical approach
1. What are chunks and what is their importance in the LA?
Chunks are multi-word units which play an important role in Secod
Language Learning. The creation and the knowledge of the chunks
have an important role in the Lexical Approach because through
them learners would have a fluent speech and they would develop a
grammatical competence. Besides, the appropiate use of chunks
combined with the grammatical component help learners to create
a pragmatic fluency in the language learning.
2. Is the theory of language behind LA modern?
The theory of language of the lexical approach is modern behind LA because
this approach add another level of structure which is named multi-words

units. Traditionally, the elements of the system only included lexical items as
well as grammatical units. The lexical approach innovate Chomskys theory
which emphasized the capacity of speakers to create and interpreted
sentences that are unique. On the other hand, the lexical approach holds
that only a minority of spoken sentences are entirely novel creations and
that multi-words units functioning as chunks form high portion of the
speech heard in everyday conversation.
3. What are the limitations in the objectives of LA?
One of the limitations that we find in the objectives of the LA is that there is
not a description of specific equips which help learners to identify and
discover the chunks in written texts. Also we think that the learning and the
use of chunks will be a tedious process to some students because it will be
similar to the learning of large vocabulary lists. Finally this approach limitates
learners to the learning and use of specific chunks which is just a part of the
foreign language learning.
4. What is, you opinion, the relationship between lexis and
grammar?
Vocabulary is typically seen as individual words whereas lexis is a concept
which consist of collocations, chunks, and formulaic expressions. It includes
certain patterns that were associated with the grammar of language. The
relationship between lexis and grammar is that through recognizing certain
grammar structures as lexical items, they can be introduced much earlier,
without structural analysis or elaboration.
5. How feasible is to apply LA in public schools in Pasto ? Why?
The lexical approach is very feasible of applying in our city because students are
accustomed to a model of education based on the memorization of lists of
vocabulary and also the explicit part of the grammar. For this reason we consider to
be viable the application of this approach because the lexical approach is based in
the learning of chunks which are unit-words such as collocations and lexical phrases
that students use in order to adquire a fluent speech. Thus, as we find a lot of
chunks in the written texts learners are going to memorize them as they memorize
grammar rules and vocabulary lists.