Howard Gardner's two works, "Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences" and "Intelligence Reframed: Multiple Intelligences for the 21st Century," help us to understand that no two children are intelligent in quite the same way.

Gardner writes that IQ tests and academic excellence have usually measured only two types of intelligence, verbal-linguistic and mathematical. Thus our schools neglect people who solve problems through other avenues.

Gardner's nine intelligences (he has recently added two more to his original seven):

1. Verbal-Linguistic - Learning through language, the ability to use language to communicate, like writers and TV announcers.
2. Logical-Mathematical - Learning through orderly processes, like scientists, mathematicians and detectives.
3. Visual-Spatial - Learning through manipulating mental images or building models, like artists, architects and sailors.
4. Bodily Kinesthetic - Using one's body to solve problems or communicate, like dancers, athletes, surgeons, and craftspeople. May learn best through simulations, role-play, and actual experience.
5. Musical - Learning through rhythm, dance, and melodies.
6. Interpersonal - Ability to understand and interact well with others, like teachers, actors, or politicians.
7. Intrapersonal - Ability to understand oneself through reflection and to manage one's thoughts and feelings, like psychotherapists and philosophers.
8. Naturalist - Learning through recognizing patterns in nature, classifying and interacting with the flora and fauna of the natural environment, like biologists and ecologists.
9. Existential - Talent for grappling with big questions like the meaning of life and death, as well as sensitivity to spiritual dimensions. (Other researchers suggest that Spiritual Intelligence may be a separate category).