Inspiration 8
Mindmaps first used by Porphyry of Tyros in the third century and now popularised and packaged by Tony Buzan have become popular in education. They have been a wonderful excuse for students to get out their colouring crayons, until now: Inspiration is a powerful piece of software that enables visual diagrams, mindmaps and concept maps to be drawn, modified and saved on a computer.
Visual diagrams drawn can easily be converted into an outline format, a hierarchical structure of the ideas. This can provide the outline for written documents.
Inspiration 8 is a real improvement over previous editions; it now has a facility to draw mind maps as well as the usual visual diagrams. It also has a Word Guide facility, which gives a definition, synonyms, antonyms and other related words.
The new version also has a drag and drop facility and video and sound integration. It is also compatible with interactive whiteboards.
It is easy to use and students can pick it up in a few minutes (for teachers it may take a little longer!). Drawing the visual diagrams is relatively straightforward. It involves a click of the mouse and then the entering in the words and a choice of image where appropriate. A useful 80-page booklet on getting started comes with the package and there are on-line video tutorials that are easily accessible.
The finished documents can be printed, saved to a word processor (either Word or Apple works), as a PowerPoint, a web page or as a graphic (gif, jpeg, bmp or wmf). The program is compatible with Windows 98 onwards and with Mac OX X 910.15 or higher).
There is a large clip art library of images that can be used, however the mathematics images are rather limited. There are a few polygons, a few three-dimensional shapes and then a file of basic mathematical symbols. I hope that future versions Inspiration will improve on this and offer a wider range of mathematical images. There is however, a search facility which enables Inspiration to connect to the Internet and find (it claims) more than a million additional symbols and images. I found a stem and leaf plots but no boxplots or cumulative frequency curves. Images can be downloaded from the Internet and pasted onto the map.
Overall, it is an excellent package – particularly for Humanities and Science students. Those who like using concept maps and mindmaps in their teaching will love it! It is well worth upgrading from Inspiration 7 to access the mindmap and Word Guide facilities.
Steve Bishop • Mathematics lecturer, City of Bristol College
Inspiration 8
Inspiration software Inc., 2006
Available in the UK from:
TAG Learning Ltd
25 Pelham Road
Gravesend
DA11 0HU
Single user: £59 + VAT
Site Licences: 5 computers £190 + VAT; 10 computers £330 + VAT
Review Sections
See also
