Students' and Teacher's Views on the Effectiveness of Multiple Intelligences-Assisted Layered Curriculum in the Social Studies Course

Abstract

The aim of this study is to determine students' and Social Studies teacher's views on the effectiveness of multiple intelligences-assisted layered curriculum. Study group includes 14 7th grade students and one Social Studies teacher at a primary school in Elazığ city center during 2010-2011 academic year. The research was conducted based on the “case study" research design, one of the qualitative research designs. As data collecting tool, student and teacher interview form and observation form consisting of open-ended questions were used. Content analysis was used to analyse the data. It was found out that the useful aspects of multiple intelligences-assisted layered curriculum were 'helping students to learn', 'repetition', 'motivating to do research', 'active participation in class' and 'increasing students' interest'. When choosing an activity, the students paid attention to whether the activities were 'difficult', 'easy', 'helpful for students to learn', 'interesting' and 'related to drawing'. In the process of implementation of the multiple intelligences-assisted layered curriculum, it was found out that the students had difficulty in 'writing story', 'writing essay', 'writing poem', 'solving test', 'drawing map', and 'selecting activity'