Related: Mind Mapping for Teachers: Tips, Tools, and Lesson Plans 4. In addition to recommending that teachers use mind maps in the classroom while teaching, Davies suggests having students create mind maps of their own that can be used to assess learning-and to compare their mind maps with those of their classmates for additional meaningful learning activities. Mind mapping, on the other hand, does create meaningful engagement because learners actively engage in the process of brainstorming, generating ideas, and connecting concepts together while reviewing and developing mind maps. It’s a More Engaging Form of Learningĭavies also argues that “meaningful engagement is a critical factor in promoting deeper learning.” Unfortunately, some of the most common learning methods-such as listening to a lecture or reading a textbook-do not create meaningful thank you for helping me teach scientific vocabulary in a more meaningful way! Collaboration and Concept mapping of anatomical term builders. Related: From Collecting Dots to Connecting Dots: Using Mind Maps to Improve Memory and Learning 3. In another study-“ The Efficacy of the Mind Map Study Technique”-researchers found that studying with mind maps helped boost retention by 10-15%. “Maps allow the separate encoding of information in memory in visual and well as propositional (written) form.” “Diagrams are more easily stored in memory than other kinds of representational formats,” Davies writes. Martin Davies writes in his study “ Concept Mapping, Mind Mapping and Argument Mapping: What are the Differences and Do They Matter,” it provides the same benefits for memorization and information retention. Mind mapping is a similar technique to loci, and as W. Essentially, they would develop mental visuals for the things they needed to remember, allowing them to recall large amounts of information-such as an entire speech-at will. But these tools have not always been as readily available as they are today.īack when writing things down was much more expensive and time-consuming, Greeks and Romans used a visualization technique called loci to memorize and recall information. These days, we have tools like printing presses, home printers, word processors, ball-point pens, and the internet-tools that all make it easy to document our thoughts on paper. The researchers assert that mind mapping helps to create this meaningful learning because it forces students to find connections between new learnings and existing knowledge.īy mapping disparate pieces of knowledge around a central topic, students can form connections between what they already know and what they’ve just learned, an exercise that leads to meaningful learning. The researchers define meaningful learning as change, which is “a consequence of the integration of new material and the prior knowledge structure.” Meaningful learning is used to describe when students have acquired new knowledge and have connected that new knowledge to knowledge they already had.Rote learning is used to describe when new knowledge is learned but not connected to any existing knowledge a student has on the subject.Non-learning is used to describe a state where there’s no measurable difference between a student’s knowledge before and after being taught new material.In “ Making Learning Visible: The Role of Concept Mapping in Higher Education,” researchers define three levels of learning: According to research, mind mapping improves learning, information recall, productivity, creativity, and more. We looked at a variety of surveys and research studies to find the seven biggest benefits of mind mapping. 7 Research-Backed Benefits of Mind Mapping So we dug into a variety of survey results and studies to find out. These are both benefits that our customers here at MindMeister cite frequently, but for this article, we were more interested in learning what the research says about the benefits of mind mapping.