Concept Maps

Concept maps are a great tool to use for things such as brainstorming however like all things it all depends on how you use them. Concept maps are a great tool for diagnostic and formative assessment. When done correctly it is a great way to link ideas and to gain an understanding of students prior knowledge and to gain an understanding about what students have learnt.

On the other hand there are ways in which the completion of a concept map can result in a tangled mess of bubbles and incoherent bullet points. One way to get around this is to complete a concept map using ICT's.

Concept maps are a great way to organise thinking and doing it through sites such as bubbl.us are a good way to firstly make sure they are saved in a place where they won't fade with age or rip like paper does and secondly it also allows for editing, rearranging and removal of elements which is not possible on paper. The above concept map was completed on bubbl.us and is just a small sample of what is possible using ICT's instead of paper to create concept maps.

The concept map expands as far as needed instead of being just confined to the size of the piece paper used and can be put onto a projector that allows for all students to see everything not just those in the front half of the room. However if a hardcopy is desired they can be printed off onto paper and can be shrunk to fit a desired page size which could very well be photocopied for each student to have a copy.