Mind Mapping

Posted 4 years ago | Originally written on 21 Nov 2007

The learning process is a sacred process: an opportunity to construct in one's (self or others') a model that will facilitate their interaction with the real world. Irrespective of the application domain, the teacher's task can be more successfully achieved if the right mental map is built - it is frustrating to be unable to converse with one's own students on the present subject matter only to be returned with blank stares.

Whenever someone clearly understands a concept, s/he develops handles - mental artifacts that represent the problem space. Mastery is one's ability, not only to strongly visualise the artifacts, but to visual patterns that the artifacts form and interpret them and thereby provide useful solutions in the physical world. Such mastery does not come easy but usually the most reliable way of developing the handles is practice. In language, they may occur as feelings about the palatability of phrases; in art they may be an acute awareness of aesthetic alignment in either 2 or 3 dimensions taking into account colour, texture and form; in music they may take the form of tonal appeal, and so on.

While different minds have different inclinations, most minds can be trained to acquire the appropriate handles necessary to perform proficiently in any domain. Genii are those who possess two things: a proclivity for developing and using handles as well as an insatiable appetite within a problem domain to render them prodigious faster than regular-minded beings.

My supreme aim is to demonstrate the remarkable facility that this provides in teaching, making learning both an enjoyable and rewarding experience.