Peppertree Montessori at Lake Montclair

Howard Gardner's groundbreaking theories were first published in Frames of Mind, 1983. Gardner was a Harvard scholar; studying work on the development of children's cognitive processes based on the work of Jean Piaget. Through his own work on the development of cognition, he came to view those of Piaget as too narrowly focused. In his innovative theory, he presents a new framework for considering the gifts of children. Through studying other cultural definitions of intelligence, neurophysiology, anthropological studies and his own experimentation and observation of children, Gardner originally devised seven categories of respective intelligence. These are: verbal / linguistic; logical / mathematical; spatial; bodily / kinesthetic; musical; interpersonal; and intrapersonal. While Gardner contends that all humans have some degree of all seven intelligences, there are those who are more gifted in some areas, or in combinations of areas, than in others. Gardner has added an intelligence that often times left out of curriculum planning alluded to as “existential intelligence.” Animated Child has added “Global Smarts” as the 8th intelligence at our facility. We believe that children should be exposed to all the world has to offer from language to culinary culture. We look forward to opening up a whole new definition of “Intelligence."