Mind Mapping

A mind map is a diagram used to organize information visually. A mind map is hierarchical and shows relationships among pieces of the whole. Other terms for mind maps include brainwriting and concept mapping. The type of diagram is called a spider diagram or radial map.

Many people enjoy thinking or brainstorming with mind maps because mind maps work the way our brain works, connecting ideas and information in the way our brains store information. You create them around a single concept, drawn as an image or words in the center of a blank page. Major ideas are connected directly to the central concept, and others branch out from those main ideas. From there, you would keep adding more related ideas or images. Here’s another article on Idea Sandbox, “Think the Way You Think,” that walks you through a step-by-step method for creating a mindmap.

I created a mindmap to show the different brainstorming techniques within this collection of methods.