What is Concept Map?

What is Concept Map?

Concept maps are tools for organizing and representing knowledge. They include concepts, usually enclosed in circles or boxes of some type, and relationships between concepts or propositions, indicated by a connecting line between two concepts. Words on these lines can be used to specify the nature of the relationships between different concepts.

The concept mapping technique was originally developed by Prof. Joseph D. Novak at Cornell University in the 1960s.37 Khincin said that concept map can help students to organize and learn the concept through creating a map that has some features and characteristics of concept.38

According to Carol Johnston concept mapping can be a technique that allows students to understand the relationships between ideas by creating a visual map of the connections. Concept map can make students to connect their ideas in studying. Besides that, students get easily to organize in arrangement of knowledge especially in English language teaching and learning. And moreover it can organize students’ ideas to absorb and adapt the information that will be organized in learning as new information.

Furthermore, concept map can be used many uses in education, business and government. In education, it is one of uses for the assessment of what a learner knows. It can be used to externalize and make explicit the conceptual knowledge both correct and erroneous that students hold in a knowledge. The educational purposes can foster the learning of a good structural knowledge by using the process of concept map.

The process of actually constructing concept map is a powerful learning strategy that is graphic in nature and forces the learner to think about the relationships between terms. This latter aspect makes concept mapping especially suited to the English learning. By drawing a concept map of a lecture or a chapter in a textbook, for example, students can identify the key concepts and show the relationships between them, helping them to understand more clearly the meaning of the material.

Concept maps have a number of very practical applications for students. They are a handy way to take notes during lectures and are excellent aids to group brainstorming. They assist in planning of students and also provide useful graphics for students’ presentations and written

assignments. They also help students to refine their creative and critical thinking.

From the explanation above the writer can divide how to construct the concept map. Firstly, students can construct their brain related to memory. It means that students memorize the topic in learning by constructing concept map. It can be called as brainstorming phase.

Secondly, organizing phase is to spread out students’ concepts on a flatsurface so that all can be read easily and, together, create groups and subgroups of related items. In constructing concept maps try to group items to emphasize hierarchies and identify terms that represent those higher categories. Thirdly, Layout phase is on a large sheet of paper try to come up with an arrangement that best represents students’ collective understanding of the interrelationships and connections among groupings.

And the last, linking phase uses lines with arrows to connect and show the relationship between connected items. In this phase, students write a word or short phrase by each arrow to specify the relationship. Many arrows can originate or terminate on particularly important concepts.

Furthermore, the students can generate their ideas in writing especially in recount text by using concept map. Not only they can generate it but also they can organize the concept map to be an effective method in learning process to solve the problem of study. The important thing of concept map itself is to create the students make a good writing easily.

Teaching Recount Text By Using Concept Map

To teach recount text by using concept map needs some procedures to do it. The writer knows that concept map is an effective teaching tool. So there are some models to construct in teaching practices. The models of construction in concept map can be applied in the class by the teacher. It can give a way to explain the subject matter especially recount text. Beside that, the students can explore their brain to remember what the teacher explains, because they are directly involved to connect the knowledge that is presented. On the contrary, the teacher gives feedback to students to their knowledge in teaching and learning activities.

According to Novak and Gowin et al, concept map can be effectively constructed through some procedures involving three steps that teacher can apply it. The first step is teacher’s preparation. It means that the teacher selects the topic of the lesson. Then, the teacher must prepare the paper to write key concept of the topic especially recount text as example. The teacher also can use the picture, photos, or drawing image related to concept map. The second step is students’ idea. In this step, students are required to think the words, ideas, and specific examples. The specific example in this research is recount text. So, students must relate the generic structure of recount text and its language features. Besides that, the teacher invites the students to share the topic of the lesson. Then, the teacher writes the example of recount text on the board with different colored chalks for links and circles to help the students see the information in recount text especially. The third step is students group. The students can brainstorm in the previous step into categories. The teacher asks students to identify the relationship among concepts. In addition, the students must discuss the topic of the lesson to tell the reason in student’s idea with sub concept to another sub concept. The students’ idea can connect concept by using concept map with lines, links, box, and circle.

The implementation of concept map activity in English teaching especially recount text must have the steps to find the connection between idea and knowledge. The first step is the teacher

must train the students. The teacher must make the type of concept map and prepare for the familiar topic. It can be found with their experience in daily activity. The second steps the teacher creates an individual maps first. Then the teacher asks students to create individual maps. This is a reflection for students because it is crucial. It will help students to understand the concept map. The third step is the teacher asks students to review with their group. After finishing the individual concept map, the students must organize in small group to discuss what they create in concept map. Beside that, the creation of concept map must be shared with their partners. Furthermore, they can find the heterogeneous concept map each other. The last step is the teacher asks each group to present their important propositions in front of the class. They must explain what the students choose.

At this point of view, the teacher must evaluate the concept map that has been created by the students. The evaluation itself can be managed through formal grading or scoring. Even though it doesn’t use grading and scoring, the teacher and students will get that concept map is so informative. Then, the teacher can use a quick scan of the map to evaluate the students’ taught to help them in generating ideas in order to be understood. In addition, the teacher can select the curriculum and make a consistent scoring process as activity in concept map that can be an assessment instrument.

In short, the concept map can be used as a method in teaching and learning activity especially in recount text. So, this method will give a way to the teacher in implementing the teaching class.

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