By Mr Kwok
Recently, I was engaged in some self-reflection on my professional journey from wayyy back till now. My entire career has been built on education in many different forms to a diverse variety of learners. As I was musing on my experiences, one question popped up, “If I am to choose a teaching method that gives the most bang for my buck, what will that be?” Thankfully, the answer did not take long to materialise.
Mind Mapping as a Learning Tool
I have discussed about mind mapping before in previous posts – Achieving a Powerful Memory (Part 1): A Method Excellent Teachers (and Students) use, The Most Functional Way to Remember School Stuff (REALLY) and others. In its typical application, the learner is supposed to make use of it to summarise and make sense of the content he has learned. At its essence, it is a tool to visualise connections across disparate pieces of information. It is neurologically powerful because it engages the learner to “digest” or reorganise the information, sometimes in ways not given in his school textbook and notes. (Interested to know more about mind mapping? Click here.)
Mind Mapping as a Teaching Tool
However, I believe that mind mapping can be used as a teaching tool for precisely the same reason – a way to visualise connections within the teaching material. It especially appeals to the visual learner in all of us. I will be the first to admit that manipulating information in my head is terribly abstract and mind numbing. I need to put down ideas on paper, be it just a piece of napkin. If the ideas involve drawing and colours, that puts the icing on the cake. Completing a mind map, I invariably feel a sense of achievement as it has become exclusive and personal to me.
Field Testing Mind Mapping in the Real World
Years ago, I had the experience of teaching a certain group of learners (let’s leave it as that). It was eye opening as they were unlike other learners I had taught before. One of the challenging issues was their weaker academic capabilities. The usual show-and-tell did not work well for them.
Trying different methods, I eventually settled on mind mapping. It is designed as a tool for the learner to cognitively organise his learning. In this case though, I used it as a teaching tool to demonstrate to my learners step-by-step how the various concepts and pieces of information are linked together. Just as importantly, they are forced to engage their visual and kinesthetic senses by mapping along with me on their tablets or hardcopy.
During the lesson, any learner with a modicum level of motivation would follow along. This was easily observable since the lessons were face-to-face. Additionally, the standard feedback at the end of the course validated my teaching method as most learners found such a learning method useful. I have since used mind mapping in teaching many other learners in a wide variety of classes from primary school students to adult teachers. The feedback has been consistently encouraging with not a single negative comment.
Final Thoughts on Mind Mapping
On reflection, my mind maps got the learners to be attentive in class and provide them with a degree of active learning. As a result, most of them could follow the lesson. Though more time was needed compared to a show-and-tell lesson, I feel that the time was well spent. It allowed the learners time to digest the content. This is especially critical for content which the learners are studying for the first time. All in all, I am certain that mind mapping has contributed to the intended outcome(s) of those lessons.
