Teaching styles and your intelligence preferences

Some teachers may provide lessons in a format that suits your intelligence and therefore your preferred way of learning better than others do. If you feedback to Staff what you found really helpful that will encourage them to incorporate more of that type of activity into their lessons plans! (Teachers respond best to postive feedback and praise just as much as pupils do!).

Don't 'write off' a teacher because s/he does not deliver material in a way you find most helpful - instead encourage him/her to do more of that type of lesson in future! In general a teacher delivers the majority of his/her material in the way that his/her intelligences prefer - but all teachers are aware of the need to vary presentation to suit the audience!

In general the following activities appeal to those preferring the following intelligences (do let me know if you can think of some more!):

Verbal/Linguistic
  • Note-taking
  • Listening to lectures
  • Reading books
  • Storytelling
  • Text analysis
  • Looking at word meanings and origins
  • Debates
  • Playing word games
  • Mnemonics
Musical
  • Singing
  • Playing recorded music
  • Playing live music, (piano, guitar)
  • Clap the Stress
  • Jazz Chants/Rap poems
Mathematical
  • Understanding/interpreting science demonstrations and experiments
  • Logic puzzles and games
  • Seeing words inside words
  • Keeping track of simple word patterns
  • Story problems with numbers
  • Logical/sequential presentation of subject matter
  • Mathematical calculations
  • Graph analysis
Visual/Spatial
  • Using charts and grids to summarise ideas - including mind mapping
  • Colour coding information
  • Videos, slides, movies
  • Using art - poster sessions, highlighting notes
Bodily/Kinesthetic
  • Hands-on activities - practical experiments, card sorts
  • Field trips
  • Role-plays
Interpersonal
  • Pair-work or group work of any type
  • Snowballing - pairs, then join with another pair etc. to share ideas
  • Card sorts
  • Board games
  • Group brainstorming
  • Group problem solving
  • Project work
  • Peer presentations
Intrapersonal
  • Individual science practical work
  • Activities with a self-evaluation component
  • Interest centres - visits to museums with individual interactive exhibits
  • Computer-aided self learning/assessment
  • Textbook use
  • Options for homework final form
  • Personal journal keeping