I can remember when I was a child in elementary school. One day, within the first couple of years of my schooling, I was given what was basically a paper and pencil "ability test". On this test I was asked to perform a variety of activities, most of which I would never encounter the rest of my life.

At the end of the test I was assigned a number which was supposed to tell everyone what my intellectual capabilities where as a human being from that point forward -- open and shut case!

I'm sure you know exactly what I'm talking about. It's the famous "I.Q." (I.Q. = "Intelligence Quotient"), a test score which claims to indicate how smart we are. How I wish we'd had a multiple intelligence test!

At the time I was in school, it was the practice in the United States to then to track or stream children according to the numbers from these intelligence or ability tests.

When the numbers were high we said, "Oh, these children are probably going to college!" How do we know? "Well, the numbers tell us. The numbers indicate that these children have the intellectual capability to handle what's involved in a college course of study."

Therefore they were put into "college prep" classes. They were often assigned to so-called "gifted" programs.

Now if the numbers were a little bit smaller we said something like, "Oh, these kids can't handle what's involved in a college prep classes so let's put them into 'vocational tech' classes so they can learn what they need to become productive members of the labor force."

If the numbers were even lower we assumed they would not be able to handle either of the previously mentioned scenarios, so they were put into "special education".

Now I know this is a bit of a caricature, but unfortunately not nearly as much as I wish it was.

SO WHY AM I MENTIONING THIS?

All current so-called "intelligence tests" or "ability tests" by design are flawed. They measure a very small range of our human intellectual capacities, namely our logical thinking abilities (per Western definitions of logic), various linguistic and math skills (which can be demonstrated in a paper and pencil manner), and fairly elementary spatial abilities such as choosing similar objects or shapes from a range of options.

Why have we chosen to define this narrow range of capabilities as "intelligence" but not our ability to express deep thoughts, emotions, and ideas through music, dance, art, drama, and interpersonal relationships?

Why do we not call one's inner knowledge about the self or the natural world around us intelligence?

Multiple Intelligence presents a very different view of our intelligence. It calls into question the basic assumptions about our intelligence represented by the "IQ paradigm."

Multiple intelligence has shown that human intelligence is a biological, neurological, psychological, sensory, and cognitive reality.

Our intelligence is much more than what goes on between our ears! It occurs throughout our entire brain, mind, body system and even beyond ourselves in our socio-cultural environment as well.

It is first of all vitally important for trainers, mentors, coaches, and consultants to understand HOW the people with whom they're working learn best, how they process information, and how they remember things. This all boils down to understanding their unique "learning profile".

A learning profile gives you a picture of the relative distribution of the eight intelligences in your participants; namely, some of the intelligences are more developed and stronger than others; some are in a state of latency or sleep; some are emerging.

The second most important concern for any training, mentoring, coaching, or consulting provided is that it must be couched in different learning modalities to address different learning profiles. This will insure that you reach everyone, everytime -- guaranteed!