I’ve been in the "business of mentoring" since 2017. Sharing knowledge is something that I have always been passionate about. The fact that being a teacher will push you to learn more, was an enjoyable sidecar to this. Initially, I taught various subjects in multimedia, such as photography, cinema, creative writing, animation, editing, visual communication, and more. Lately, I've been focusing more on teaching human-centric design. There are so many good memories and experiences that I can share about mentoring, but this is not the piece for that. I am going to talk about a learning model that I came up with and the challenges that led me to its inception.
A significant drawback when it comes to the students of our country is their reliance on passive learning. They were never taught to engage with the content nor were they educated on the importance of having “dialogues”. A major chunk of my students were comfortable being an inactive presence throughout these sessions. Many were reluctant to ask questions (some even resisted answering them).
Another challenge was the fact, that to be good in design or any topic for that matter, you need a 360-degree understanding of the subject. A linear flow as like in school education won’t help them at this level as time is of critical importance. They need to simultaneously know the concepts, technologies, applications, skills, pioneers of that industry, trends and updates. Text book learning models are not going to help them much in this situation. After trying out various established models, I decided to come up with my own— and I called it, CrawlMat.
Before building the model, I had a couple of considerations.
Students must have a one-stop destination where they can have a bird’s eye view of the topic they will learn.
There must be a clear flow from one topic to (its subtopics and) another topic. When there they can see connections, they will understand the topic holistically.
Students must be able to identify where they stand in this flow of knowledge (Something like the “You are here” sign on a mall map), so they can always go back, and move forward in the right path.
They must be able to interact with these topics by having conversations/ dialogues!
The content needs to be dynamic, modular, and progressive
The whole learning process should be fun!
The inspiration came when I was playing with Adam on his mat where he was learning to crawl. He was looking at the shapes printed on the map and was moving from one shape to another. This gave me a narrative to build my model. Create a crawlspace for students!
People learn faster by Connecting
People learn faster by Communicating
People learn faster by Collaborating
And then there it was, CrawlMat!
Crawlmat provides you, with a living and expanding brain map of your knowledge on a particular subject.
Crawlmat is initiated and driven by the mentor(s).
You can build your Crawlmat in any Whiteboarding tool.
The mentor will list out the topics, sub-topics, and contextual information in the crawlmat with paths connecting these content.
Text, Images, Colors, URLs, and file Attachments of all kinds can be used in the crawlmat.
Students will have access to comment on the above information added by the mentor. They can engage in conversation regarding a particular topic. Other students will also be able to participate in the conversation using the same thread.
Let's see this in action.
For better understanding, here are the crawlmat glimpses from my design class.
Currently, this crawlmat is moderated and controlled by the mentors. They will be adding the topics and subtopics as they narrate the theory in class. Students can comment on their learnings, questions etc under any topic or subtopic. Eventually, student moderators from each batch who can also contribute to content development (other than comments) will be added.
So if you look at the above screenshot, I (as a mentor) will be starting from a blank canvas and write the title, UXD (the yellow marked title), and will build the rest of the content as and when I talk about it in the class. So that they are seeing how the content is built and how the flow happens. You can see that there is a tool central, where students will be introduced to the tools that they will be using for the module, you can also see the UX project that they will have to do at the end of the module.
Students can select any sub-topic and comment on it to get further clarification when they are studying later (As shown in the screenshot above).
Students can build their independent crawlmats to study a specific topic or interest. The above screenshot is of a crawlmat created by a student of design.
Crawlmat has several applications beyond classrooms. This can be used as a knowledge base for teams, where everyone can be a contributor.
Here are some words from students who have experienced Crawlmat.
I've used Crawlmat myself, and it’s been a fantastic experience. It really helps in organizing thoughts and diving deeper into any topic. The way it grows and adapts makes it easier to understand complex ideas. It’s been great to see how it expands my knowledge and brings new insights- Yogyata Sancheti
Been a part of this model of learning, Its like taking well documented effective notes but a whole model that does that for you and then some more 🙌 ✨ - Mohit Kumar
As a person who loves taking notes in class and then later expanding the notes in a whole other book, the Crawlmat is super helpful! Not only does it help me with stuff I’ve missed out, but most times after searching a topic up on Google and getting many opinions, the Crawlmat allows me to instantly voice my confusion and get an answer in return! Can definitely say 10/10 super helpful :D — Harini Shankar
A free webinar on how to implement Crawlmat model is on its way!
For any info, write to maheshravi@outlook.com.
Crawlmat is an IP of Mahesh Ravi (2023). and is Free to use.
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