A Goal Setting Tool I Taught In School - 5 Lessons Learned

I discovered Tony Buzan's 'Use Your Head' book while looking in a second hand bookshop over two decades ago. It marked the start of my fascination with the concepts and potential of mind maps. I was intrigued enough by the material in the book to try out mind mapping while I was teaching high school science. This article summarizes the lessons learned from the classroom experience.

1 - Use What Works:
Children under a heavy school workload were well accustomed to taking piles of notes. Things may have changed for the better since the 1980s but that was the reality back then. Understandably, my students were initially not quite sure how to respond to this mind mapping test period! Mind mapping therefore had to be selectively added alongside the traditional note taking experience.

Goal Setting Lesson:
Experiment with mind mapping for specific topics and use note taking as an addendum for any details you believe have been missed.

2- Feeding The Habit:
While taking mountains of notes certainly requires time and effort, it also cultivates the lazy mental habit that is mindlessly copying chunks of information from a textbook or blackboard word-for-word. Alas, my classes loved to
be drip fed notes.

Goal Setting Lesson:
Take a popular goal setting book and read one chapter. Then put the book aside and simplify the chapter title as one word in the center of a sheet of paper. Next, let your imagination roam and add about five keyword concepts from
the chapter sole word branches on your map.

3 - Patience:
Beginning mind mappers often get frustrated with their limited ability to recall keywords from the material they have recently read. The important point here is 'patience' - that is, an awareness of the time and effort required to learn and improve at a new skill such as mind mapping.

Goal Setting Lesson:
Begin your mind mapping journey with books you really enjoy. With regular practice, more and more ideas will bubble up from your memory banks as you concentrate on the main keyword. Remember to add them as single keywords to the map using a pencil, not a pen! For my science classes this was never easy because many teachers and role models had drilled into them throughout their school years the 'fact' that pages and pages of notes were absolutely a
requirement to pass exams.

4- One Word:
This is perhaps the hardest task of all! It is a lot easier to write a sentence or two than condensing the meaning into just one word. Of course there are some unique challenges when applying the keyword approach to topics such as mathematical proofs or scientific formula. These don't easily lend themselves to traditional mapping techniques - hence my advice around using what works.

Goal Setting Lesson:
Pick out the optimal summary keyword and start with that, leaving the nested sub-branches and supporting linear notes to take care of the details as and when they come to you.

5 - Review:
Good old-fashioned homework! Not quite. Most goal setting mind maps are invariably a work in progress and will require periodic review to remain relevant. 25 years ago this was somewhat of a chore to do using pencil and paper - my students sure didn't like it! Nowadays there are great mind mapping software packages which can be used as a very effective goal setting tool. I use 'MindGenius Business' from the Scottish company, Gael software.

Goal Setting Lesson:
Check out the capabilities of the commercial and open source software packages as a potential goal setting tool. The commercial packages usually have a free trial period.

By: Mark McClure

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Mark McClure is a certified life and career coach.