Free tools online - Mindmapping

Create a free mindmap, save it and it becomes searchable. Map your mind - Mayomi. I love discovering free and open source tools. Though not always perfect, they provide hope for the kind of teacher that I am:

• limited access to the computer lab
  
• too new to have software purchasing suggestions taken seriously!

I love mindmapping/brainstorming as a tool for generating ideas. It allows me to cull the best ones, and tease them out a little more. I know that my students often procrastinate - not beginning work on major projects and assignments until the night before. As a teacher, I try as much as possible to make them accountable for all of there work, demarcating specific steps that I want to see completed, for example, brainstorming. They are then asked to reflect on the work that they have completed, and to consider what needs to be done.

By asking students to stop and reflect on their journey, I am hoping for a bit of introspection from my students. I think it is essential to pause and consider what it is, exactly, that we are doing. I think that my students put off their work for the same reasons I do - they feel overwhelmed and don't know where to begin. Mindmapping is one way to make an insurmountable task seem more manageable.

Caveat: There are no privacy options on this website, so whatever you create remains public. Anyone will be able to see your mindmap, so do not post sensitive information that you would not want someone else to find. The site has been created as part of a larger research project that you can read about on the website.

http://www.mayomi.com/