MULTIPLE INTELLIGENCES, PROBLEM-SOLVING, AND DIVERSITY IN THE GENERALCLASSROOM

Classroom teaching strategies and curriculum based on the theory of mu ltiple intelligences (Gardner, 1983), principles for differentiation t o meet the needs of gifted students (Maker & Nielson, 1996), and integ ration of culturally and linguistically appropriate content have been advocated for students with diverse learning needs, including gifted s tudents and students learning English as a second language. In this st udy of two teachers' classrooms, pre- and postassessments were used to compare teacher's level of implementation of the DISCOVER(1) approach on: problem-solving behaviors, number of students identified as gifte d, problem solving by gender, and problem solving by students' languag e of preference. Significant relationships were found between level of implementation by teacher and positive changes in problem solving in Pablo(R) and math activities, mean math performance, and number of stu dents identified as gifted on postassessment. The results indicate the value of the DISCOVER approach in general classrooms with a high prop ortion of Spanish-speaking or bilingual children.