What a concept map is
A concept map is a diagram of ideas joined by labeled lines. Each pair of concepts, together with the label between them, forms a short statement, such as “photosynthesis produces glucose.” The labels are what separate a concept map from a list of related words: they say how two ideas are related, not just that they are.
Concept maps were developed in the 1970s by Joseph Novak and his research team at Cornell University, as a way to record how students’ understanding of science changed over time. Today they are used for studying, teaching, planning, and research, anywhere it helps to see how the parts of a subject depend on each other.
Step 1: Write a focus question
The most common reason a concept map turns into a tangle is that it has no boundary. Before adding anything, write the one question the map should answer. “How do plants make their food?” produces a much tighter map than the single word “photosynthesis.”
The question tells you what to include and, just as usefully, what to leave out. Put it at the top of the page or board so it stays in view while you work, and check new concepts against it.
Step 2: List the key concepts
Collect the concepts the answer depends on, without connecting them yet. Somewhere between 10 and 25 is plenty for a first map. Keep each one short: a noun or short noun phrase such as “sunlight,” “chlorophyll,” or “Calvin cycle.”
Avoid full sentences inside a concept. The explanation belongs on the links between concepts, not in the boxes. If a concept does not help answer the focus question, set it aside at the edge of the page rather than deleting it; it may turn out to matter later.
Step 3: Arrange from general to specific
Place the broadest concepts near the top and the more specific ones below them, with examples at the bottom. The layout does not need to be perfect. It needs to make the structure visible, so a reader can tell at a glance which ideas are central and which are details.
Move things freely at this stage. Grouping related concepts close together now makes the next step, drawing the connections, much easier.
Step 4: Connect concepts with labeled links
Draw a line between two concepts only when you can say how they are related, and write that relationship on the line as a short verb phrase: “requires,” “produces,” “is part of,” “is an example of,” “causes.”
Then read each link aloud from one concept to the other. “Light reactions produce ATP” is a complete statement you can check against your notes or textbook. If you cannot find a label for a connection, treat that as a finding: it usually marks a gap in understanding worth going back to.
Step 5: Look for cross-links
Once each part of the map holds together, look across it. A cross-link connects concepts in different branches, for example linking the light reactions in one area to the Calvin cycle in another with “supply ATP and NADPH to.”
Cross-links are often the most valuable part of a map, because they show how separate pieces of a topic depend on each other. A map with no cross-links is usually an outline drawn with boxes.
Step 6: Review and revise
Read the finished map as a set of statements and check each one. Replace vague labels such as “relates to” or “involves” with something specific. Connect any concept that has no links, or move it off the map.
Expect to revise. A concept map is a thinking tool, and redrawing it after a day or two, or after checking it against a source, is where much of the learning happens.
Making a concept map in Canvio
In Canvio each concept is a sticky note or text block, and each link is a relation you can label, so the map reads on screen the same way it would on paper. Relations stay attached when you move notes, which makes reorganizing cheap instead of a redraw.
To start from a worked example rather than a blank board, open the photosynthesis study board from the Canvio for Students page, choose Remix this board to make your own copy, and replace the concepts with your topic.