Thing Fourteen: Mind Maps and Flow Charts

     I chose to explore bubbl.us and mindmeister because they seemed the easiest to navigate. Mind meister even lets you try it without signing up, which I found really appealing. They are both simple to use- basically you just start typing your first idea, and the program tells you exactly which keys to press to create the next bubble/ box you need to keep forming your image. This could be a useful tool for me to quickly show students how to use brainstorming tools so that they can use them personally. I could also use them for class discussions, to give them a visual representation of the content we are going over. For example, if we are discussing learning tools, I could make a mind map showing all of the ideas my students and I come up with during class.