Dear Online Concept Map,

I am sorry. I have ignored you for some time. I knew you existed but, as a time-poor teacher, your software seemed unnecessary. I assumed that having each student use pencil and paper to compose a concept-map in his/her own exercise book was a sufficient alternative to an online version. Forgive me. I didn’t realize your software had additional features to stimulate critical and creative thinking. And who would have thought that you sought to have students collaborate to compose each concept map, let alone that you wanted these students to share their maps with others? I promise to never dismiss your potential again.

Apologetically Yours,

High School Teacher

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A recent encounter with the technical report “The Theory Underlying Concept Maps and How to Construct and Use Them” by Joseph D. Novak and Alberto J. Cañas (2008) provided this educator with the opportunity to recast concept maps as a central and meaningful, rather than a supplementary, learning activity. Novak and Cañas’s report triggered a new appreciation for online concept maps due to their suitability for collaboration and ability to trigger critical and creative thinking.

The benefits of online concept maps over their offline equivalent:

• Multiple students can collaborate in real time to create, edit, and debate their concept map’s construction. Screenshots can be taken or URLs generated to enable sharing with other students.

• Online versions of concept maps may be edited, refined, and enhanced at all stages of their construction. Concepts initially placed in one part of an online map can be dragged easily to a different section should the students recognize a more appropriate or additional relationship.

• Some online concept mapping tools allow users to see a step-by-step animation of the concept map’s construction. This feature can prompt revealing conversations between teachers and students about their cognitive processes and understanding of the topic.

• Some software packages allow for URLs, images, and annotated notes can be hyperlinked to each node (the shape containing a single concept within the map). Other tools allow for students to link an individual node to a separate, but related, concept map. Following such links allows students to dive deeper into concepts of personal interest or need.

• While concepts can be provided by the teacher, or identified by the students, the appropriate cross-links lines and arrows interlace the concepts to show a relationship. Cross-links can include linking words/prepositions (is, has, enables, implies, produces, is reliant on, raises the issue of) must be determined and applied to the concept map. Critical thinking skills are essential at this stage of the map’s construction to ensure the cross-links selected convey their understanding of the topic accurately.

Nicole Timbrell is a high school English teacher at Loreto Kirribilli in Sydney, Australia. In 2013-2014 she took a year away from the classroom to complete graduate study in Cognition, Instruction and Learning Technologies at the University of Connecticut. Follow her on twitter at @nicloutim.