Howard Gardner

“For most, the school is the first model of a community, and it can be a very powerful one. We need to ensure that young people are raised in educational communities that they admire and that they will seek to emulate or re-create for the rest of their lives.”

“Much of education can and should take place in schools and other formally designated community institutions. But the world beyond the schoolhouse is crucial to education, and both traditional and new media are more important than ever.”

“While we may continue to use the wordssmart and stupid, and while IQ tests may persist for certain purposes, the monopolyof those who believe in a single general intelligence has come to an end. Brain scientists and geneticists are documentingthe incredible differentiation of human capacities, computer programmers are creating systems that are intelligent in different ways, and educators are freshly acknowledging that their students have distinctive strengths and weaknesses.”

“Truth is about propositions. When it comes to determining truth, it is vital to understand the methods used by individuals in asserting propositions.”

“It's absolutely clear to me that Obama has enormous intrapersonal intelligence. His book, 'Dreams from My Father,' is an amazing book, and it's obvious to everybody he has lots of intrapersonal intelligence.”

“I am basically a supporter of Barack Obama - it is not easy to be a post-partisan president in a hyper-partisan era.”

“In a large country like the United States or India, families differ significantly on their own education values, and I don't believe it is necessary to put everyone through the same curricula and assessments.”

“Stories are the single most powerful tool in a leader's toolkit.”

“Anything that is worth teaching can be presented in many different ways. These multiple ways can make use of our multiple intelligences.”

“If we want to have good workers and good citizens, we need to create common spaces in which individuals can talk about the moral and ethical dilemmas that they have faced and how they resolve them.”

“Since we all have different cognitive profiles, educators should take those individual differences very seriously.”

“I align myself with almost all researchers in assuming that anything we do is a composite of whatever genetic limitations were given to us by our parents and whatever kinds of environmental opportunities are available.”

“It's important to underscore that it is not mediocre test scores that have caused the major problems in the U.S. It has been unnecessary wars, ranging from Vietnam to Iraq, and unfair financial practices on Wall Street. And these were brought about by 'the best and the brightest,' many of whom were educated at my own institution.”

“I am trained as a psychologist, and I think of all human issues in terms of psychology, neuroscience, genetics, and evolutionary theory.”

“When we teach in pluralistic ways, there are two wonderful dividends. First of all, we reach more students, because some learn best through stories, some through works of art, some through role play etc. Second of all, we show what it is like really to understand something.”

“I need to add that my work on multiple intelligences received a huge boost in 1995 when Daniel Goleman published his book on emotional intelligence. I am often confused with Dan. Initially, though Dan and I are longtime friends, this confusion irritated me.”

“Every child needs to become literate in one or more languages, and every child should become comfortable in the major scholarly disciplines - historical, scientific, mathematical, and artistic-humanistic thinking. Beyond that, I am not in favour of a uniform system. I think there should be some choices.”

“If I know you're very good in music, I can predict with just about zero accuracy whether you're going to be good or bad in other things.”

“While I've worked on many topics and written many books, I have not abandoned my interest in multiple intelligences.”

“Twenty-five years ago, the notion was you could create a general problem-solver software that could solve problems in many different domains. That just turned out to be totally wrong.”