Role of Differentiated Listening Instruction via Attending to Learners’ Multiple Intelligences in Enhancing Listening Performance of Iranian Learners

One efficient way through which learners’ differences can be tapped and learning outcomes improved is implementing individualized strategies by adopting differentiated instruction (DI). Though many researchers, thus far, have addressed different benefits of differentiation, the possible role of DI in bringing about listening enhancement is still among the underresearched areas. Mainly aimed at finding the would-be effect of multiple-intelligences-based differentiation on students’ listening comprehension enhancement, we embarked on a study with 80 participants from a language school. The students were all adult learners (both males and females) and had taken an IELTS-preparation course. Using Mckenzie’s (1999) MI inventory three dominant intelligences (verbal-linguistic, logical-mathematical and spatial) were identified. The learners possessing other less frequent intelligence types were assigned to control group. After running IELTS listening pretest, the treatment was conducted for a matter of 14 sessions for each group differently in accordance with the characteristics of each intelligence type. The control group, however, went through the normal instruction. After running the posttest, the data were analyzed through Kruskal-Wallis test and a significant difference was observed among the groups which could be assigned to the practice of differentiated instruction. The implications are discussed throughout the paper.