Can Your Grades Determine How Smart You Are?
Can Your Grades Determine How Smart You Are?
If you were one of those people who dreaded receiving report cards because you did not get good grades in school there is a high chance that you have probably lived your whole life thinking and believing that you are not very smart, unlike other people. Can your grades determine how smart or intelligent you really are?
No, grades do not determine how smart or intelligent you are despite what you may have been led to believe. Grades determine how well you can perform when you are under the stress and pressure of being a student in school.
Your grades are also dependent on how much interest you have in a subject, how much effort you put into completing the course requirements, how well the subject was taught, how clear and culturally bias free the test was, and possibly what the teacher believed about your capability in a given subject.
In my experience, most schools tend to recognize and honor students who are good at certain subjects like Science, and Math and not others as much like arts.
So, you may be wondering what are some of the other types of intelligence that you might not have heard about that you need to start recognizing and honor. Let’s discuss next nine types of such intelligence that have been identified.
9 Types Of Intelligence To Learn, Recognize, And Honor
A professor and a psychologist by the name of Howard Gardner identified nine types of intelligence that we need to all learn about and appreciate. He wrote a book called Frames of Mind in which he described this different identified intelligence.
Here are 9 of the intelligence that he wrote about below. You may recognize that you possess more than one of the mentioned intelligence.
Naturalist Intelligence
As a naturalist you love nature, recognize patterns in your natural surroundings, and are sensitive to your environment. Some of the areas you excel in are hunting, gardening farming, and zookeeping.
Musical Intelligence
If you have musical intelligence you recognize the tone, pitch, rhythm, and notes of music and can pick up new instruments easily because that is your calling.
You can easily recall a piece of music which your heard and play a musical instrument by ear. You could play a musical instrument in a symphony, or be a DJ, composer, singer, and music teacher.
Logical-Mathematical Intelligence
Math and logical intelligence enable you to thrive and live in the world of abstract symbols and thoughts, formulas, strategy, hypothesis, and reasoning skills are your expertise.
You love strategy and solving math problems. Some of the career paths that would be good for you are mathematician, detective, scientist, computer programmer, and inventor.
Existential Intelligence
As someone with existential intelligence, you probably wonder and often ask yourself questions like why are we here? what is our life purpose? what’s the meaning of life?
Your philosophical mind probably keeps you up at night. A career path for someone who’s existential could be a philosophy teacher or professor.
Interpersonal Intelligence
Your interpersonal intelligence enables you to be great at socializing and has deeper connections with people because you can read others’ emotions well, and are empathetic and compassionate.
You are open to understanding and learning different perspectives that people have, are willing to put yourself in other’s shoes, and can tell if someone is pretending to be someone that they are not.
You understand other people and know the impact of your interaction with them. Good career choices for you would be a peacemaker, social worker, counselor, actor, and teacher.
Bodily-Kinesthetic Intelligence
You feel your body and mind are in harmony and can use them to achieve your goals. You tend to move well in space and have really good eye-hand coordination.
You are very aware of your body and have excellent motor skills and movement. You do well as a dancer, and sports(athlete).
Linguistic Intelligence
As a linguistic genius, you do well with language and have a vast vocabulary. You are a deep thinker. You have a gift of learning and picking up different types of foreign languages and the meaning of different words.
You enjoy reading and writing. You do well as a public speaker, lawyer, journalist, politician, and novelist.
Intrapersonal Intelligence
Intrapersonal intelligent people are often very quiet and deep emotional thinker. You tend to be very self-aware of yourself, and what you want and are a self-motivator.
You are very much in touch with your mind and body and are in tune with your feelings at a deeper level than most people. You do well as a psychologist, philosopher, or spiritual guide.
Spatial Intelligence
Visual spatially intelligent people are good with directions, strong visual learners, 3D graphs, puzzles, mazes, creative drawings, and charts. You think in 3D and have artistic skills and great imagination. You do well as a sculptor, painter, sailor, pilot, and architect.
In conclusion, you now know that grades do not determine how smart or intelligent you are despite what you may have been led to believe. Grades determine how well you can perform when under the stress and pressure of being a student in school.
You also learned that grades are dependent on how much interest you have in a subject, how much effort you put into completing the course requirements, how well the subject was taught, how clear and culturally bias free the test was and possibly what the teacher believed about your capability in a given subject.
You are now aware that Howard Gardner has discovered 9 intelligence namely Naturalist, musical, Logical-mathematical, Existential, Interpersonal, Bodily-Kinesthetic, Linguistic, Intrapersonal, and Spatial intelligence.
Which one of the above-mentioned intelligence do you have? Always remember you have been given unique gifts, wisdom, natural talents, and intelligence based on whatever you need to fulfill your purpose while here on this earth.
Discover what is for you and use it to serve others.
Next, read why is it bad to put labels on people for further insights and tips.