A New Approach to the Teaching of Foreign Languages: the Development of Bodily-Kinesthetic Intelligence within the Framework of the Theory of Multiple Intelligences

Abstract

This paper presents a discussion on the development of body expression as a mean of promoting disinhibition, in other words, the perception of one’s own body where there is other people. Consequently, it will produce motivation and promote creativity. In the foreign language classroom it is possible to get to this stage through the development of games, dance and activities that allow contact with the other. Thus, based on some questions raised by the cognitive development theory to treat the study of processes such as language, perception, memory, reasoning and problem solving and some discussion of the multiple intelligences theory of Gardner (1994), specifically about the bodily- kinesthetic intelligence, it is intended to analyze how the wok with body language can help in the development of a student's abilities and encourage his/her creativity and his/her process of acquisition and learning in the classroom, concretely, the foreign language class. In addition to bodily-kinesthetic intelligence, Gardner proposes that each person has at least eight intelligences or cognitive skills which work together, but as autonomous entities that require interaction. The author assumes that all intelligences are equally important, although each person has an intelligence more developed than another, depending on the cultural setting in which he/she is inserted, which may explain, to some extent, why people learn in different ways, according to their skills. However, although all intelligences are equally important, our school system tends to emphasize logical-mathematical intelligence and linguistic intelligence to the point that, in some cases, deny the existence of the others. Therefore, education should be thought from a point of view which considers the different ways of learning and, in the specific case of the teaching and learning of foreign languages, it is important to adopt a "plural approach to cognition", not an "unilateral" one, different from many authors who have treated human development.