The Use of Multiple Intelligence, Humor, and Technology in the College Composition Classroom: A Practical Approach

1. The Use of Multiple Intelligence, Humor, and Technology in the College Composition Classroom: A Practical Approach Katerina Andrioti, Ph.D. Dean of Arts and Sciences St. Joseph’s College, New York

2. Why Multiple Intelligence? The “One-Size-Fits-All” ideal is outdated and does not apply to our students anymore. According to Walter McKenzie, in fact, students’ orientation to learning required tools that were not available. In other words, “if the only tool you have is a hammer, everything around you looks like a nail. . . .” W. McKenzie

3. Why Social Media? • “Social Media is the collection of tools and online spaces available to help individuals to accelerate their information and communication needs.” Axel Schultze

4. Why Humor? Why Not?

5. Multiple Intelligence Theory Howard Gardner: • Co-director of Project Zero and Professor of Education at Harvard University.  Redefined intelligence from a single quantifiable entity that is registered on a standardized test to a full spectrum of intelligences that are combined and used in highly personal ways.

6. How Can I Apply MI Theory to Help Students Learn Better? According to Howard Gardner,learning isboth asocialandpsychological process.When students understand the balance of their own multiple intelligences, they begin To manage their own learning. To value their individual strengths.

7. Today’s Students—Digital Natives ⏏ Consumer experience drives expectations (MI and Social Media) Desktop to mobile computing Web sites to web experiences Solitary games to participant/group play Static web content to real-time interaction and collaboration Telephones to integrated mobile information Email to instant video, voice and text messaging

8. Multiple Intelligence Theory • Gardner’s multiple intelligences theory challenges us to look beyond our available technologies because in the information age, we have technologies evolving that hold new promise to reach all learners. (2002) (Do not teach information; teach people)

9. Including Social Media in Course Development ✔Blogging a contraction for the term “web logging” is best described as a form of micro-publishing on the internet. ✔Wikisare websites that allow the users to add, remove, edit and change available content. This ease of interaction and operation makes a wiki an effective tool for collaborative writing and revising. ✔FaceBook and similar social networking sites are designed to connect users. Facebook is the leading social networking site for college students. In this platform, users are able to create profiles that include everything from their basic information, to their interests, affiliations, photographs, and video. ✔Second Life is a Linden Lab creation: a revolutionary new form of shared experience, which is a 3D virtual world created solely by the users or residents.

11. Multiple Intelligence Theory Absorbing course material can be different and unique for students.

13. Multiple Intelligence Theory How are we smart? Linguistic Intelligence • How can I use the spoken and written word? (Desktop & Web-based publishing, PowerPoint presentations, sentence & essay writing, poetry & story writing, lecture, dice games, discussion letters, dialogue, plays, email)

14. Multiple Intelligence Theory Spatial Intelligence • How can I use visual aids, visualization, color, art, or metaphor? (Graphic images, PowerPoint presentations, student presentations, charting, graphing, utilizing online platforms and editors, prepared or created images, digital animation)

15. Multiple Intelligence Theory Bodily/Kinesthetic • How can I involve the whole body or hands-on experience? (Use of tactile materials, group work, presentations, diagramming, videoconferencing, sorting various materials by attributes, participating in virtual group simulations)

16. Multiple Intelligence Theory Logical/Mathematical Intelligence • How can I bring in numbers, calculations, logic, classifications or critical thinking skills? (Sorting sentences & essays, PowerPoint presentations, group work, Venn Diagram sorting, analyzing data, use search engines to run queries, & various online platforms to problem solve)

17. Look like your Dog Contest

18. Multiple Intelligence Theory Musical Intelligence • How can I bring in music, environmental sounds, and set key points in a rhythmic or melodic framework? (Incorporate digital sounds into PowerPoint & multimedia presentations, group work, rap, chant, song, poetry)

19. Multiple Intelligence Theory Interpersonal Intelligence • How can I engage students in discussion, cooperative learning, or large group simulation? (Small & large group work, synchronous--chat-rooms or asynchronous--email, discussion boards, dice game, dialogue, role playing & various collaborative projects)

20. Multiple Intelligence Theory Intrapersonal Intelligence • How can I evoke personal feelings or memories, or give students choices? (Narrative essays, letters, answers to guided questions posted on the discussion section of Blackboard)

22. Multiple Intelligence Theory Naturalist Intelligence • How can I appeal to the students’ love and understanding of nature? (Group work, organizing & making sense of information, through creation of databases or semantic mapping)

23. Multiple Intelligence Theory Existential Intelligence • How do I appeal to the students’ ability to conceptualize and philosophize deeper questions regarding human existence? (Virtual communities, Virtual art exhibits & Virtual field trips)

24. Multiple Intelligences Matter According to Gardner, addressing all intelligences in the classroom is paramount for the success of all students. Variation of subject content may result in higher levels of student achievement and success. Variation in assessing student knowledge must be part of lesson-plan and implementation.

25. Funny? Who? Me? • Not necessary to Dress up in costumes: • Humor is not taking more time to prep your classes • Humor is not becoming a stand-up comedian • Humor is not drastically changing the way you’re doing things in your classroom

26. How Do I use Humor in the Classroom? • Create a positive atmosphere where students are not afraid to make mistakes. • Encourage them to bring jokes and cartoons, do the same, share with the class before you begin. • Every week bring a different pointer for your board or PowerPoint presentations. (Golf clubs, fishing rods, pool cues, kitchen utensils, makeup brushes, etc.) • Include a trivia question half way into a quiz or a text.

27. Why Use Humor • Employing a sense of humor can lower blood pressure, improve blood circulation and energy and help alleviate job stress and burnout. • Using humor in the classroom can increase the students’ attention span. • Humor can diminish anxiety and reduce the threatening nature of the course by changing the tone of the instructional process. • Your students may even arrive to your classroom earlier than usual.

28. ENGLISH: COLLEGE COMPOSITION

29. Dr. Andrioti’s Rules 1. Don't abbrev. 2. Proofread carefully to see if you any words out. 3. Don’t use question marks inappropriately? 4. Excessive use of exclamation points can be disastrous!!!!!!!!! 5. Never use that totally cool, radically groovy, out-of-date slang. 6. Profanity sucks. 7. Be more or less specific. 8. Placing a comma between subject and predicate, is not correct. 9 Don’t repeat youself, or say again what you have said before. 10. Hopefully, you will use words correctly, irregardless of how others use them. 11. Note: People just can't stomach too much use of the colon. 12. About sentence fragments. 13. Each pronoun agrees with their antecedent. 14. Just between you and I, case is important. 15. Don't use commas, that aren't necessary.

30. More Rules 16. Only Proper Nouns should be capitalized. also a sentence should. 17. begin with a capital and end with a period 18. In letters compositions reports and things like that we use commas to keep a string of items apart. 19. Verbs has to agree with their subjects. 20. A writer mustn't shift your point of view. 21. Don't write a run-on sentence you've got to punctuate it. 22. A preposition isn't a good thing to end a sentence with. 23. Avoid cliches like the plague. 24. And don't start a sentence with a conjunction. 25. Its important to use apostrophe's right. 26. It's better not to unnecessarily split an infinitive. 27. Don't use no double negatives.

31. VARIOUS APPLICATIONS OF MI Dice game: • Role the dice. • Use punctuation marks, or various terms, formulas, concepts, etc. in a sentence of your choosing. • Combine group sentences to make a story, recreate a law, concept, formula, etc. • Present your results to the class.

32. Use the ellipsis ( . . . ) to indicate missing . . . • Retirement is a verb . . . not a destination. 2. Ernest Hemingway was a really, really, good righter. . . . He was so good that he won the pull it surprise for his book The Old Man and the Sea.

33. Good teaching comes in myriad forms, but good teachers share one trait: they are truly present in the classroom, deeply engaged with their students and their subject. They are able to weave a complex web of connections among themselves, their subjects, and their students, so that students can learn to weave a world for themselves. The connections made by good teachers are held not in their methods but in their hearts—the place where intellect and emotion and spirit and will converge in the human self. Parker Palmer, 1998

34. Thank you! Kandrioti@ymail.com