Beyond Smarter

Book excerpt: Originally developed to help students overcome learning obstacles created by emotional trauma or neurobiological learning disabilities, Reuven Feuerstein’s work is now used in major cities around the world to support improved thinking and learning by all students. This book is the most up-to-date summary of his thinking and includes accessible descriptions of his tools and methods for cognitive modifiablilty and mediated learning. With dramatic case studies throughout the text, Feuerstein and his co-authors define intelligence as a dynamic force that drives the human organism to change the structure of thinking in order to answer the needs it encounters. They describe in detail the specific skills of the three stages of thinking: Input or observation and data-gathering stage, Development or processing stage, and Output stage, including analysis, synthesis, and communication. They show how student thinking can stall in multiple ways at any of these stages and how intentional mediation can help students restructure their thinking and improve their ability to learn. Similarly, the authors address mediation of social and emotional skills that impact learning. This new book from an educational icon and his colleagues will inform the work of any educator seeking to improve student achievement in their school or district.