In The Nature of Intelligence and Its Development in Childhood, I seek to make one big point and a number of subsidiary ones. The main point is that intelligence is not equivalent to scores on IQ tests or proxy tests, such as SATs, ACTs, A-levels, and the like. There are many different ways of looking at intelligence. Society tends to focus on one of those ways, to the exclusion of others. This is a serious mistake. Why? Consider the just five of the main points of the book:

1. Intelligence is, beyond all, the ability broadly to adapt to the environment.
   Intelligence is not about a test score, but rather about one’s ability to adapt to the environment—to handle the challenges and complexities of everyday life, including school problems but going way beyond such problems. How well can you manage your life? How do you get along with others? What do you do when things go wrong in your life? Indeed, what do you do when your life becomes a total mess? These are the kinds of things intelligence is about.
2. Intelligence is not just what intelligence tests and their proxies test.A test score tells one very little about life problem-solving skills. Real-world problems are very different from school problems—they are much more complex, more emotionally fraught, and laden with real-world consequences. Some people are good at solving the fairly small-bore problems schools present, but they cannot solve complex real-world problems, or vice versa.
3. Intelligence is not well assessed by a single number or even two or three numbers. Intelligence is often characterized in a number or two. Wrong! Intelligence has a number of aspects, in my own theory, not just analytical, but also creative, practical, and wisdom-based. More importantly, intelligence, in the end, is your ability to make the most of your life and what you have to give to the world. It’s not just about a stale, singular IQ number. No one number can capture what you have to give back to the world.
4. Intelligence is modifiable. A single number will never capture intelligence also because intelligence is modifiable. There are so many ways to get smarter: Go to school; learn how to do new things; think of ways to make more of your life; accept new challenges; never say that you “know it all.” Some testers may want you to believe that you cannot increase your intelligence because to believe otherwise would be to believe that your test score is somehow just a temporary characteristic of who you are. But that is exactly what it is—a temporary characteristic that may not even generalize from one test to the next.
5. Schools often do not teach in ways that optimize the development of a broad range of intellectual skills and attitudes. Schools so often emphasize the academic side of life. They may prepare students for tests that also emphasize the academic side of life. When you think about intelligence, do not think just about your grades and test scores. Think about what you have to offer the world. Then offer it. That will tell you how intelligent you are!