What Does It Mean to Be Intelligent?

What does it mean to be an intelligent person in the 21st century?

Before reading further, take a few minutes to pause and consider this question from a number of different perspectives:

Do you think the definition of "intelligent" has changed in the past 100 years or more?

Now, get a pencil and quickly, off the top of your head, write down 10 words or phrases that you associate with intelligence.

"What I associate with the word intelligence is..."

Next, think of 10 people (friends, family, or someone famous) who you consider to be intelligent. Write down their names.

Do the qualities of intelligence and the names you wrote down have anything in common? Are there differences in the ways in which these individuals are "smart"? Did they all do well in school? Were any of them horrible at school but great at life...or music...or painting?

Next, read and complete the sentence below:

"People who are intelligent..."

Think of a time in your life when you felt most intelligent. Did this have anything to do with school or was it more related to a real life activity? Was there one class in school where you felt "smarter" than all the other students? Math? Geography? History? Photography?

Now, complete the following sentence:

"I have felt most intelligent when..."

What kind of jobs do intelligent people do? Do you see an artist with a sketchpad? Or perhaps a software engineer in front of a computer? How about a caregiver for mentally disabled children, or a person who trains dogs or other animals? Do people who are great at these "intelligent" jobs have different kinds of intelligence?

Before we move on, here are some other questions to ponder:

Finally, if you could sum up your thoughts on intelligence in a sentence, how would it read? Write down your answer.

Intelligence is...

Since time immemorial, philosophers, psychologists, educators and everyday people have used a wide variety of definitions and words to describe "intelligence."

Because intelligence is so complex, it seems to have a different definition in every culture or time. Like the concept of beauty, it's defintion changes according to the fashions of the day.

Of course, how a society defines powerful concepts like intelligence or beauty can have profound implications for the fate of individuals.

The point is that definitions are important and can have significant and lasting impact on the lives of specific individuals as well as institutions that are charged with educating young people and developing human potential.