How intelligent is your child?

I’m always amazed at how most new parents believe that their child is a genius. They marvel at how quickly he walked or how well she speaks. They are amazed at his memory or how good she is with people. They just know that the world will one day see how amazing their little prodigy is!

With time when the child goes to school however, they are quickly differentiated and graded.

According to our education system, there are two types of children; those who have good academic and memorisation skills and those who do not: The bright and the not so bright. Parents with ‘bright’ children are affirmed at every prize-giving day as their children scoop prizes and accomplishments. Parents whose children are labeled as not bright push their children hard to improve on their grades and if they can afford it, pay for extra tuition or transfer them to a school with better exam results hoping to improve their test scores.

But is it possible that our academically inclined school system is hurting our future national development by only rewarding one type of proficiency? Our education system was actually designed by the British to harness the ‘brightest and the best’ laborers for their colonial enterprise.

After colonialism, we retained this mentality, so rather than training to develop our people resource, we are educating our children to serve foreign multinationals! As a result, many of us come from ‘shags’ or live near places where people live in poverty and need simple practical solutions. Yet our MBA in strategic management is of no help value in solving real world problems!

Harvard professor Howard Gardner in his theory of multiple intelligences talked about at least eight different types of intelligence. People with musical intelligence have good pitch and can easily sing, play instruments or compose music.

Those with verbal intelligence are good with words, reading, telling stories and languages. Mathematical intelligence means you are great with logic, abstractions and numbers.

Meanwhile, those with bodily intelligence are super at sports, dance, acting and making things.

People with interpersonal intelligence are very sensitive to the moods and feelings of others and great at showing empathy and understanding. Those with intra-personal intelligence have a deep awareness and understanding of themselves. Those with spatial intelligence have the ability to visualise objects from different angles with the minds while those with naturalistic intelligence are great at understanding nature and their surroundings.

In essence, psychology supports the Bible’s view that all our children are intelligent! They are, as the Psalm writer said, ‘fearfully and wonderfully made’. Most have several intelligences blended together while a few are extremely gifted in one of the areas. While the natural temptation is to focus on strengthening a child’s areas of weaknesses, it’s actually more beneficial to discover what their strengths are and to focus on helping them become extremely good at what they are already good at!

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