An investigation into types of multiple intelligences and activities used in English classes at primary schools

Abstract

The main purpose of the study was to investigate primary school students’ multiple intelligences according to their preferences and how the multiple intelligences differ in terms of grade level, gender, school and English classroom activities. This research was conducted in six primary schools in Çanakkale and provinces of Çanakkale with a total of 269 sixth and eighth grade students and 9 English Language teachers in spring 2008-2009 semester. There were 138 male and 131 female students. There were 171 6th grade and 98 8th grade students in the study. In this study, three different inventories were used. A Multiple Intelligence inventory and an English classroom activities inventory were applied to the students and an English classroom inventory was applied to teachers of English. The data obtained from the study was analyzed statistically by using both Excel and Statistical Package for Social Sciences Program (SPSS) through use of descriptive statistics, independent Samples T-Test, and Analyses of Variance (ANOVA). The results of the study showed that primary school students’ multiple intelligences showed variety according to their grade levels, gender and school. There seems to be a correlation between students’ dominant multiple intelligence types and activities preferred in English classes. And the students perceived activities related to the musical intelligence to be the least useful activities. According to data obtained, English teachers participated in this study frequently use activities related to visual/spatial and verbal/linguistic intelligence in their classes and they ignore some activities related to another types of multiple intelligences like musical intelligence.