A Brain Reflecting its Learning in a Mind Map!

A wonderful thing to see

Okay! I confess … I am not quite sure what the Central Image is here .. but you know what? It's the right size, it's in the right place and it's got at least three colours associated with it so it scores all the marks for a Central Image according to the Paris marking Scheme for the World Mind Map Championship. 

So guys - please don’t shy away from using a Central Image and retreat into just using words. It's not nearly so effective in helping you remember your Mind Map and won’t help you score high in the Championship. 

Easy with the Words!

In fact, the one negative I would say about the Central Image is that it includes writing as well as the proto Mind Map within the Central Image - I feel that the writing may well be redundant.

In real life when you are Mind Mapping we are not marking the quality of your artwork but instead, we are looking at the quality of your thought processes - how you learn and respond to your learning

Of course in the World Mind Map Championship, we're also marking your artistic ability, so over the next few months, it would be really good if you could all practice and improve your ability to create very simple images neatly and clearly. It really will help to increase the marks that you get in the World Mind Map Championship but it will also improve the quality of the recall you can have from your own Mind Maps that you use in your own life.

This Mind Map completely fills the page. Considering it is a Mind Map of the most difficult discipline within the World Mind Map Championship, that is making one as someone is speaking it is very difficult to ensure that you don't end up with a lopsided Mind Map

This competitor however has managed to spread the data over the whole of the page - Bravo!

The "Magic Number"

The branches are clear with very accurate differentiation between each branch. I notice that there are a total of nine branches on this Mind Map and I would suggest that this is perhaps in the upper region of how many branches a good Mind Map would contain. We know that our memory works naturally on something called the “magic number” - that is, the short-term memory can remember 7 plus or minus 2 bits of information before engaging in spaced repetition and transferring it to long-term memory. 

This is a very long way of seeing that the optimum number of branches within a Mind Map should be 7 plus or minus two - so between five and nine main branches.

I noticed that this competitor has created a yellow branch. I also saw that this competitor has realised that there is an issue in using yellow ink on white paper and swapped it out fairly quickly to using black ink to write with so that the writing remains legible.

The reality is the yellow ink gets lost fairly easily on white paper, even more so if you use copier paper for Mind Mapping. Copier paper is actually quite acidic and we find that in a very short time it will "eat" the yellow ink. In fact, you can go back to a Mind Map and find just a few months later that the yellow branches have literally disappeared. We suggest therefore that you don't use yellow for creating main branches on a Mind Map but use that just for highlighting or colouring in images.

Love the Energy!

You can feel the energy in this Mind Map. There is a feeling that this was created in real-time, there is an urgency, and immediacy about the writing and formation of the branches. I love this! We know that the best time to learn new information is the first time that you hear and process it and this Mind Map clearly demonstrates an intelligent brain learning, responding, and recording new information

Tony Buzan used to refer to this as “the blossoming of intelligence”, where you can watch the brain process in live time and for us all here at my Mind Map HQ it is the most exciting thing to witness

So, for next year what advice would I give this competitor?

I think it's about time you graduated!

No seriously!

This Mind Map clearly demonstrates your intelligence and your ability to process, assimilate and respond to new information. It also shows that you understand and can use the laws of Mind Mapping as set forth by Tony Buzan himself. So for next year, I would like to elevate your Mind Mapping slightly by asking you to use finer pens so that you can give a more in-depth response to the talk by being able to cascade down a few more layers. Finer pens will just help to refine the look of the Mind Map and permit you to incorporate more data points and keywords.

But I love this! I love its energy, I love it's vitality, I love it’s immediate response to new information. Beautifully executed Mind Maps are always a pleasure to see. But to see a Mind Map of a brain reflecting in real-time its learning experience is one of the greatest honours we could ever be bestowed.

Thank you very much for sharing this Mind Map. I hope to see you in 2022 at the World Mind Map Championship where you can demonstrate even more of your brilliance. 

Like Elaine, I’d like to know if and why the centre is a doughnut, or bagel or a snail shell, even a fossil ammonite! It does the job though.

Basic Ordering Idea Branches

Take care with your main branches. They need to be thick where they join the centre and taper all the way out. This Mind Map has banana and almost teardrop shaped branches. I know this was done at speed but it takes no longer to draw a correctly, curvilinear, tapering branch than it does to draw a misshapen one. In each case it’s two pen strokes. It is good practise to take a blank sheet of paper and fill it with branches. Some flowing left and some right. Start slow and as it becomes more fluid speed up. Once you’ve done 100 or so you will have built the muscle memory and it will feel totally natural. 

The arrow is relatively nicely shaped but It is clearer to draw solid arrows than a dashed one (and quicker).

There is a lot of information captured and organised well. Good use of colour. The branches are easily discriminated. Good to have some sketched images - something that is not easy when under time pressure.

Always Printed Words on Branches

There are a few instances where it looks like words are at the end of branches, not fully on them – I’m looking at the extremity of the yellow branch. I think there may be instances where It is verging on joined up handwriting. Make sure to print all the words.

This individual has talent and great potential. With thinner pens, a little more neatness and control they’ll go far.