[EDLING:2032] thought organization and mind mapping

[sicola at DOLPHIN.UPENN.EDU]

Hello everyone,

It's not exactly research, but I thought this tool was worth sharing. I just 
found out about a fully legit free software download that allows you to 
create "mind maps" or "word webs" or whatever term you prefer in a wonderfully 
organized fashion on the computer. Whether you use it yourself to 
conceptualize a research project, lit review, etc. or use it as an eductional 
tool for teaching writing, or something else, I have to say it's very user 
friendly and I plan to use it with my ESL writing students immediately. It's 
called Freemind, takes all of 3 minutes to download (if you need to download 
the javascript first, that's another 3 minutes) and then it's ready to go. 
Five minutes of playing around and you figure out exactly how it works.  
Here's the link:

http://freemind.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Main_Page

I hope many of you and/or your students find this tool helpful.

Happy pre-writing,

Laura



-- 
Laura Sicola
University of Pennsylvania
PhD Candidate 
Educational Linguistics