June 21, 2022

How to create a Mindmap when Studying?

Psychological research states that writing things leads to better learning as the information better sticks to your memory. And that’s exactly where techniques like mindmapping come into the picture. For it is all about jotting down your thoughts and connecting them with related information.

What is a mindmap?

When you learn a new topic with mindmapping the idea is to simply structure information and write it down. Such that the central theme can map knowledge in a way that will help you better understand and retain information. In other words, break them into bite-sized bits that are easy to remember and ponder upon!

A mindmap can most simply be explained as a basic representation of your ideas and understanding of a particular topic. It can be described as a visual thinking tool that helps you represent your thoughts and understanding in simple terms. Such that you can simply map knowledge and help yourself revise and retain information.

These are brainstormed ideas put together without the worry of a specific order or structure. The visual information is created around a certain concept, with associated ideas branching out and being arranged around it. This simple method would help make note-taking a lot easier. Especially with online learning, if things seem to move too fast, this method will help you record your notes better.

How do I create a mindmap?

We could divide it into 3 major steps Start > Develop > Repeat

Take a sheet of paper, decide upon the main topic that you wish to develop and start with writing/ drawing it in the middle of the sheet.
Next, develop it by adding to the central topic some major sub-topics that connect best.
Repeat the process by adding more branches and connecting corresponding lower-level subtopics (sub-sub-topics) to the subtopics present.

Characteristics:

Crystallize the main idea/ subject in the center.
Themes radiate from the central image as 'branches'.
The branches comprise either keywords or key images drawn or printed on its associated line. As this would be easier to record, and also grasp and retain.
Topics of lesser importance are represented as 'twigs' of the relevant branch.
Remember that the subtopics are to be simple explanations/ examples of what the topic is all about.
And finally, the branches form a connected nodal structure.

Benefits of a mindmap

It helps you remember and recall information. The whole purpose of a mindmap is to help you make the information so simple and compact that you will be able to benefit from it easily.
Learn new concepts with ease. Explain to oneself in ways that you best understand, hence, making learning new topics more fun.
Brainstorm individually or in groups with this method at your disposal.
Improves productivity, as you have good practice with brainstorming.
Makes note-taking a lot easier and quicker, while being understandable too.
Planning, researching and consolidating information from multiple sources becomes easy.
You can use the method to revise.

In short, it helps with meaningful learning as it creates a connection between your new and existing knowledge. Thus, strengthening your depth of understanding.

Conclusion

This would help you with easy note-taking and gathering more information. Further, would also help you immensely when it comes to revising and retaining information.

This is a helpful tool for both offline and online classes. However, it is especially effective with online learning as in such a case the connection is at times limited.

However, that problem can be solved with a good online learning app, like that of Winuall. It helps you not only take live classes with ease but makes one-on-one interaction, sharing of class recordings and notes, and a lot more things convenient.