CLASSES have just started for many of our kids. How do you manage your child’s school work? Do you have difficulty getting your child’s attention? Is it easy for your child to memorize facts?
I remember how I studied when I was in grade school. My grand aunt tutored me on Chinese daily till I was in the second grade. Because my memory was not really that good, my grand aunt patiently guided me with repeated test papers at night and early morning reviews. After that, I learned to manage on my own. Below is the process on how I studied:
- Read and highlight notes and textbook. Put formulas and key concepts on index cards.
- Prepare 1 spring notebook.
- Do test questions based on the notes and textbook on the spring notebook.
- Answer on a separate sheet.
- Check work. Mark my mistakes.
- Review the test paper and repeat writing my mistakes again the next morning.
- When Unit Test time comes, I compile all the quiz test questions on the same subject from my spring notebook and then answer them again on a separate sheet of paper.
- When periodical exam comes, that’s the only time I directly answer on my test sheets.
- For Chinese, where it is harder to review just the answers, I would use carbon paper and do three sets from the time we have our first quiz.
When my kids were about to start the big school, I started wondering how to prepare them. Do I employ my rigorous study methods on them?
Is there a quicker way than the repeated drills and test papers? Based on my experience for my two kids, I have discovered that as much as methods may vary due to the personality and the learning type of each, I was able to use one method that worked for both of them.
When my daughter was two, I chanced upon a business tool in a seminar called Mind Maps. My intention for attending this seminar was for our company’s goal-setting. It was great that this method was actually helpful both at work and at home.
According to author Tony Buzan in his book Mind Maps for Kids, “Mind Maps have helped me to write, solve problems and make my life easier, and be more successful…Mind Maps have already helped millions of students around the world get better grades with less work.”
The premise of Mind Maps is that our brain thinks in colors and pictures. The book discusses how our brain has the left and right sides. In line with making notes at school or doing one’s homework, the book states that the left brain picks up words, logic, numbers, sequence, linearity, analysis and lists. The right side, on the other hand, works on rhythm, awareness, imagination, daydreaming, color and dimension. Normally, a person would use the left brain to study, which means he or she is using only half of the brain. With Mind Maps, you can actually use both sides of the brain.
The five easy steps to follow are:
- Use a blank sheet or unlined paper and colored pens.
- Draw a picture at the center representing your main topic.
- Draw thick, curved, connected lines from the photo to branches of the subtopics.
- Name each of these ideas or draw a little picture of each that represents the keywords.
- From each of these ideas, you can add thoughts by adding branches.
Mind Maps helped a lot when I was teaching my kids. When my daughter started the big school, she had a hard time listening when learning. She would always get distracted. One time she had to memorize a poem. I would dictate a line and asked her to repeat it. We did it so many times but she would mostly be looking around. I then drew out the song in pictures, presenting the stanzas similar to a Mind Map. It made learning more effective and relaxed. I later on used this method to teach her core subjects. Today, my daughter does her customized “Mind Maps” in remembering facts in Social Studies and Science.
Even when my kids had a tutor in their first and second grade, I would still use Mind Maps to work through concepts which they found difficult to grasp. In the last school year when Marcus was in Grade 3, I was training him to study on his own. I was surprised that when I asked him to do a reviewer for his Christian Living class, he made the diagram (shown in the collage above) on his own.
Mind Maps is a great tool you can share as a family. I remember even using this tool with my daughter for her first fund-raising project in school. The very first Mind Map I did is also seen in the collage. The facilitator asked us to do one about our own life. My center image represented my goal for happiness. The branches showed different facets of what happiness concretely is for me. Because it was a diagram, I felt my goals imprinted in my head. From my family life to my far-fetched goal to write and study more, and even to my kids being nation-loving, this Mind Map has continuously guided me through many things I aimed for in 2008. A funny anecdote I have is that I had only one child then and was not pregnant with my second, yet. I specifically drew a boy beside my daughter in this Mind Map. It is a blessed coincidence that I did give birth to a son the next year!
Happy “Mind Mapping,” everyone.