Hello, welcome to my first book review post! My intention is to compile a list of book recommendations that will be helpful to parents in general, and homeschool parents in particular. For my first book review, I’m pleased to tell you about 8 Great Smarts by Kathy Koch, a book I first heard of during a homeschooling webinar with the Massachusetts Family Institute (which is a fantastic resource, by the way!)
Essentially, 8 Great Smarts is a book about multiple intelligences, and how understanding these types of intelligence can be helpful for teaching children. Based on work by Howard Gardner and Tom Armstrong, two developmental psychologists, the different types of intelligence are broken into eight categories or “smarts”: word, logic, picture, music, body, nature, people, and self.
Kathy Koch, who has a phD in reading and educational psychology, does a brilliant job describing the attributes of each of the eight smarts. Each smart has its own chapter that not only describes it, but also offers insight into how a smart may affect a child’s relationships, faith, and career interests. For children that may not be as strong in a particular smart, each chapter also offers ideas to help strengthen them.
Koch’s best insight in the book is the idea that adults often mistake a child’s smart for bad behavior. For example, a body smart child may fidget a lot, a word smart child may interrupt a lesson with comments when they are excited, a logic smart child may question their instructions often, and so on. Koch is careful to point out that being strong in a smart isn’t an excuse for bad behavior, and that it is important to teach children to use their smarts in healthy, positive ways. I appreciate Koch’s balanced approach here because I have often suspected that adults view children as having malicious intent much more often than they actually do.
As a Christian, I also appreciate Koch’s consideration for how the smarts make a difference in a child’s spiritual life. For example, word smart children will probably connect with God through Scripture reading, music smart children through worship songs, and so on. While this isn’t necessarily a groundbreaking concept, knowing how to use the gifts we have been given by God to serve others and grow in our faith is very important!
Whether you are a Christian or not, this book is a helpful resource for understanding how people think and learn. This is especially useful if you are a homeschooling parent taking full responsibility for your child’s development. I really love Koch’s view of children that is empathic without being naive to their occasional mischief (which adults are also guilty of!) This book has already been improving my tutoring sessions, so I am very grateful for it. I highly recommend 8 Great Smarts to anyone with children in their life.