It is fair to say that it is almost impossible to walk a way from a semester and not have learned anything. After 18 weeks every student must have attained some kind of new knowledge or intelligence. Ironically enough, the subject in which I best acquired a firm grasp on in our AP English class this semester is that of the multiple intelligences. There are eight original intelligences. Among these are: kinesthetic, linguistic, logical, interpersonal, intrapersonal, musical, visual/spatial, and naturalistic. Most people have approximately three of these intelligences, but some are naturally gifted with more or all of them. Recognizing our own intelligences may be difficult at times, however, there are recourses available to help us on this journey. Such recourses include reflections, essays, and tests that are made accessible to the public online. I tend to favor in the linguistic, intrapersonal, and musical intelligences. This means I am word, self, and music smart.
Linguistic intelligence is the ability to use and manipulate words to make a reader or listener better grasp the concept or point that you are trying to convey. Through my poetry I can manipulate, not only my words but my readers as well. I do this by making the reader feel either what I feel/felt, or what I want them to feel. Words flow naturally to me like they have some kind of home or safe heaven hidden in my mind and when they are ready to be found, to be seen by the rest of the world, they make their escape through the tip of my pen. When I write, fiction or non-fiction, I place myself in the specific time and setting in which this particular event(s) has or will occur. I can describe things I have never physically felt or seen using words and I can do it so that the reader or listener will believe it has occurred to me personally. I can also write an essay on a subject matter I have never learned, or take no interest in, and make it a considerably well crafted essay. I do believe I am word smart.
Intrapersonal intelligence is the intellect that allows you to know yourself. Someone who has conquered this intelligence will know their weaknesses and their strengths. Often these people also keep diaries. I myself am well aware of my limitations and advantages. As a leader in MCJROTC I am encouraged to seek out my weakness and improve them. I am also promoted to know my advantages and use them to the best of my ability in order to ensure proficiency in everything I do. However, I do not keep a diary per se. Rather I have journals upon journals that contain poems, essays, reflections, ad such that I have constructed in my spare time. I suppose these writings could be seen as a diary as they are my vent. They are my anger, impurities, flaws, emotions, and thoughts bleeding themselves onto paper, beseeching my mind for rest. These writings are my understandings of myself and my life. I am self smart.
In addition to the intelligences listed above, I also consider myself to be musically intelligent. When I hear music, I hear poetry. I hear an event being sung, an artist proclaiming his or her need to be heard. I do not write songs or play an instrument by I can express myself through the writings of other artists. I hear their grief or happiness in the words they use and I understand the moral, the intent of the song they have written. Also, being in MCJROTC and cheerleading has taught me to think in terms of beats. At what beat do we change to alternative beat and transition to the next formation? What note should the second opening stunt hit on? When things get to be too much for me to handle, I put my Ipod on choose music that best describes how I feel or what I am going through at the moment. I am music smart.
On the contrary, of all the intelligences I have introduced of course there is going to my weaker aspect. Spatial intelligence is not something I am particularly gifted in. This also known as visual intelligence and is the ability to learn from things such as pictures. People who are well off with this intellect may be good at illustrations, mazes, puzzles, graphs, and map reading. It is a common intellect among artists. I cannot say that I fully grasp and under the idea of visual learning because I do not. I need to be heard through writing. All the same, I learn through written material. Images do not speak to me. I am not visually smart.
Eighteen weeks of school have come and gone and what is left to show of them? Well grades are certainly one thing we can take a look at. Yet it is most accurate to do a self examination. In doing so we should ask ourselves what it is that we learned and why this is of any significance to us. As for me, I learned about the multiple intelligences as well as which intelligences I have a firmer comprehension of and which I do not. I can use this knowledge outside of my English class to better understand the world around me. That being said, nothing we learn within classroom walls is meant to stay encased in the room. I believe everything we are taught has some sort of use in the bigger portrait of the world and life. The information fed to us by our teachers and superiors is not meant to be discarded without any further application of thought. This semester was the beginning of my junior and loaded with new information. However, high school is the beginning of life!
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