How do you make a mind map for studying?

What is a mind map?

A mind map organizes a chapter in space rather than in lines. The theme takes the center of the sheet. Each main part forms a branch, which splits into keywords, examples and dates. The eye takes in the chapter at a glance, which a sheet written out over several pages allows less.

It’s often confused with the concept map. The latter links notions with labeled arrows, like “causes” or “opposes”, and doesn’t necessarily start from a single center. A good study mind map borrows this habit from it: it names the links between its sections.

It helps when a chapter is dense and you get lost in its parts, or to prepare the outline of a written answer or an oral.

How to make a mind map from a chapter

Take an A4 sheet laid out horizontally, or an A3 for a long chapter, and keep your course open. Allow about twenty minutes for a first version, as a guideline.

The work changes nature the moment you close the course. As long as you draw with the course open, you’re organizing; when you redraw from memory, you’re testing yourself.

• Write the chapter title in the center, in a few words.
• Draw one branch per main part of the course, usually three to six, following the teacher’s outline.
• On each branch, add keywords rather than sentences: a notion, a date, a name, an example.
• Link with an arrow the elements of two branches that depend on each other, and write on the arrow the verb that describes the link.
• Check each keyword against the course: a shortened definition must not lose its condition.
• The next day, redraw the map from memory on a blank sheet, then compare with the first version.

Example described in words: inflation in economics and social sciences

In the center, “Inflation”. First branch, the definition: a general and lasting rise in the price level, measured in France by Insee’s consumer price index. Second branch, the causes: demand-pull inflation, when demand exceeds what the economy can produce, and cost-push inflation, when energy, raw materials or wages get more expensive.

Third branch, the consequences: a drop in purchasing power if incomes don’t keep up, a real easing of fixed-rate debts, a loss of price competitiveness against countries where prices rise more slowly. Fourth branch, monetary policy: the European Central Bank aims for 2% inflation over the medium term and can raise its key interest rates.

Common mistakes and limits of the mind map

A mind map can give the impression of a lot of work done without having taught you much, especially if you spend more time decorating it than checking it.

A study by Karpicke and Blunt published in 2011 shows the limit of a map made with the course open. Students who had built a concept map with the text in front of them remembered less, a week later, than those who had practiced free recall for the same amount of time, including on a final test that asked them to draw a map.

Finally, the mind map doesn’t suit everything. A calculation method or a proof is learned by redoing exercises; the map can at best remind you which method to choose in which case.

• Spending an hour on colors and drawings, at the expense of testing time.
• Copying sentences from the course onto the branches: the map becomes a twisted sheet, unreadable at a glance.
• Lining up sections with no links between the branches.
• Making the map only once, with the course open, without ever redrawing it from memory.

How do you test yourself with your mind map?

Once the map is checked, use it as a base for questions. Cover a branch with a sheet of paper and retrieve what it contains. For each arrow, ask yourself why this element leads to that one. For an oral, the map becomes your outline: explain each branch out loud, without reading, following the arrows.

You can also start from the central theme alone, on a blank page, and redraw the whole map. Go back first to the arrows you forgot: they’re the ones that carry the reasoning. Here is a typical half-hour session, to adapt to your chapter:

• 5 minutes: redraw the map from memory starting from the central theme.
• 5 minutes: compare with the original and fill in what was missing in color.
• 10 minutes: go back over the forgotten branches and arrows with the course.
• 10 minutes: with the course closed, answer a few questions or a multiple-choice quiz on the chapter.

Using it with Fichea

Fichea doesn’t generate a mind map. You can, however, start from the study sheet it creates from your course, as a PDF, pasted text or photo depending on your plan: check it against the course, take its headings as branches, then draw the map yourself, by hand or in the tool of your choice.

To test yourself afterwards, start a multiple-choice quiz or flashcards on the same chapter. If the link between two branches escapes you, ask Luna, the chat assistant: her answers rely on quoted passages from your course, which you can check. The features available depend on the plan.

Frequently asked questions