Modern Instructional Strategies: Concept mapping discusses concept mapping, a graphical tool for organizing and representing knowledge. Concept mapping involves connecting concepts with linking lines and labeling each line to show relationships. It helps students organize information and connect new ideas to prior knowledge. Developing concept maps involves selecting key concepts, ranking them by abstraction, clustering related concepts, arranging them diagrammatically, and linking them with labeled lines. Concept maps assist both teaching and learning by allowing teachers and students to discover relationships between concepts and use them to take notes, plan studies, and present information.

1. Modern Instructional Strategies: Concept
mapping
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By,
Sandhya J
Mathematics

2. 2
INDEX
Contents Page number
Introduction 3
Concept mapping 4-8
Conclusion 8
References 8

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INTRODUCTION
A mathematics teacher has a variety of strategies available for use in teaching mathematics. The selection of
a suitable strategy depends on the objectives of the needs of the learner and the nature of the content. In a
traditional classroom, instruction is teacher-centered and group-paced. It caters to the needs of ‘average’ students
and does not make allowances for the vast individual differences found in the classroom. Students differ in their
interest, aptitude, attitudes, and intellectual abilities and in a number of other aspects such as pace of learning,
learning style, cognitive style and so on.
Nowadays teachers are following the modern instructional strategies. These include pragmatic, associate and
lecture approaches. Modern instructional strategies are those strategies which are constructed on the basis of the
interest, or aptitude of the students in classroom. Different modern instructional strategies are :
 Cooperative learning strategies
 Collaborative learning
 Concept mapping
 Gradation
 Simulation
From these, concept mapping is discussed here.

4. CONCEPT MAPPING
Concept maps (knowledge maps or mind maps) are graphical tools for organizing and representing
knowledge. Concept mapping is the individualized technique of summarizing the relationship among
different ideas in graphs while engaged in learning activity. It is developed by Novak in 1972. A concept
map is a diagram showing the relationships in between concepts.
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According to Novak,
“A concept map is a visual representation of the hierarchy and relations among concepts within
an individual’s mind.”
In a concept map(C-map), the concepts, usually represented by single words enclosed in a rectangle
(node), are connected to other concept boxes by arrows (arcs). A word or brief phrase, written by the arrow,
defines the relationship between the connected concepts.
Shortly, a concept map (mind map) is a knowledge model, represented as a labeled set of nodes and
arcs used to summarize a body of knowledge on a topic, much like an outline.
Characteristics of Concept mapping
1. Concept map is a tool for organizing and representing knowledge in graphs.

5. 2. It is a graphical method of taking notes.
3. It visualizes relationships between different concepts.
4. It is a special form of a web diagram for exploring knowledge and gathering and sharing information.
5. Concept maps connect multiple words or ideas.
6. A concept map presents the relationship among a set of connected concepts and ideas.
7. It is a pictorial representation of concepts in different hierarchies.
8. It consists of nodes (vertices) and arcs (links). Nodes represent concepts and arcs represent the
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relations between concepts.
How to develop concept maps?
Concept maps are graphical tools for organizing and representing knowledge. They include concepts,
usually enclosed in circles or boxes of some type, and relationships between concepts indicated by a
connecting line linking two concepts. Words on the line, referred to as linking words or linking phrases,
specify the relationship between two concepts. The following are the steps involved in drawing concept
maps:
1. Select: Focus on a theme and then identify related key words or phrases.
2. Rank: Rank the concepts (key words) from the most abstract and inclusive to the most concrete and
specific.
3. Cluster: Cluster concepts that function at similar level of abstraction and those that interrelated
closely.
4. Arrange: Arrange the concepts into a diagrammatic representation.
5. Link: Link concepts with linking lines and label each line with a proposition.
Example: Polygon family tree from the class IX
Topic: Polygons Concept: Growing shapes

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Polygons
Triangles
Acute
Obtuse
Isosceles
Right Equilateral
Scalene
All angles
are less
than 90°
One angle
greater
than 90° One
angle
90°
All angles are
equal
No sides are
equal
Two sides are
equal
Quadrilaterals
Parallelogram Trapezium
 Both pairs of opposite sides
are parallel and congruent.
 One pair of opposite sides
are parallel and congruent
 Diagonal bisect each other.
 Exactly one pair of
opposite sides are
parallel
 Exactly two pairs of
consecutive angles
are supplementary
Rectangle
 All the properties of a
parallelogram
 Has a right angle
Rhombus
 All sides are congruent
 Diagonals are perpendicular
Square
All the properties of parallelogram, rectangle, rhombus
Other polygons
Pentagon
(5-sided)
Hexagon
(6-sided)
Heptagon
(7-sided)
Octagon
(8-sided)

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Another example:
Nature of the solution of second degree equations
Standard : X
Topic : Second degree equations
Concept : Discriminants
풂풙ퟐ + 풃풙 + 풄 = ퟎ
Solution
Greater than zero equal less than zero
to zero
푥 =
−푏 ± √푏2 − 4푎푐
2푎
Discriminant
풃ퟐ − ퟒ풂풄
Two solutions No solution
One solution

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Importance of concept maps
The following are the important uses of concept maps in classroom learning:
1. The implementation of concept maps in the classroom allows both the teacher and the student discovering
and describing meaningful relations among the concepts.
2. A concept map helps to connect new ideas to knowledge that the learner already have.
3. They are a handy way to take notes during lectures and are excellent aids to group brainstorming.
4. They assist in planning studies and also provide useful graphics for presentations and written assignments.
5. A concept map can be used not only as a learning tool but also an evaluation tool.
CONCLUSION
A concept map is defined as a graphic representation of a person’s knowledge of a domain. They help the learner
to refine his creative and critical thinking. Concept mapping provides a framework for organizing conceptual
information in the process of defining a word. If we allow the students to create their own concept maps in
classroom it will result in the enlargement of their cognitive structure.
REFERENCES
(1) Psychological bases of Education- Dr.N.K.Arjunan
(2) Teaching of Mathematics – Dr. Anice James
(3) Kerala Reader – Mathematics Std X and Std IX