Visualize the Web

Do you like concept maps? I do because I'm a "visual learner." I read a rather funny Twitter back and forth between two people the other day about in which one stated "We are all visual learners, so quit calling yourself that!" Funny and accurate. 

Concept maps were new to me before I began my M.Ed., and I fell in love quickly with Webspiration. I have found that it is a difficult transition for students to go from traditional outlining to concept mapping but Pearltrees is going to bridge that for me in the fall. Read this article to learn how it's different from other bookmarking tools like your web browser or Diigo.

My plan is to implement Pearltrees as students use their RSS feeds (via Google Reader) to explore topics of interest for their writing activities. As they find sites they want to bookmark, they'll create a pearl for that site attached to a pearltree, which represents the topic, and they'll share that with me either through Pearltrees, blog, text, or email. Once they've mastered organizing pearltrees (visual folders), they should understand concept mapping by simple osmosis. From there I can introduce c-mapping for writing outlines. I think using Pearltrees will be an eventful way to make concept mapping a no-brainer.