CEDO 525 - Enhanced Learning - Comparing Online Mind Mapping Tools

I compared 3 of the online tools from week 3.  Here is the entire list of choices so I can come back and look at this later:
1. Bubbl.us (http://bubble.us)
2. Webspiration (http://www.mywebspiration.com)
3. MindMeister (http://www.mindmeister.com)
4. exploratree (http://www.exploratree.org.uk)
5. http://www.educationoasis.com/curriculum/graphic_organizers.htm
6. CMAP (http://cmap.ihmc.us/conceptmap.html)

     I had heard about MindMeister a few times during classes in this grad program so I was eager to check that one out first.  The first thing I needed to do was sign up for a free account, which required you to activate it through an email.  Having email addresses for students is a problem for us right now but it is something that I am working on.  The free account allows you to have a max of 3 mind maps at a time, which I thought was adequate.  I liked the familiar interface and I thought it was very simple and easy to create idea bubbles and modify their contents.  It was easy to insert pictures by using mindmeister's library, through a search(which tied into Google images) or by pasting the URL of a picture.  I didn't get to try any collaboration but that would be a powerful feature if it worked well.  I had a little trouble creating idea bubbles off of existing branches (child bubbles), however, so that was a little turn off.  Maybe I was doing something wrong but if I, the technology teacher, was having trouble that's not a good sign.
     The next one I tried was Bubbl.us.  This one is really simple, even concerning the effort to get started.  You actually could start using their mind mapper without creating any kind of login.  The drawback there is that you can only print, not save your mind map.  Even so, you can create a quick login by simply providing a username and password.  No real name and no email addresses are necessary.  The features of Bubbl.us are scaled back in comparison to MindMeister (no picture insert, less formatting options) but I thought the interface was a lot easier to use.  You can print and you can save into their online folders.  It looked like you could have up to 3 mind maps just like MindMeister.  I didn't see a collaboration feature so that would be a minor drawback.  Overall a nice, simple little Web 2.0 tool with less hoops to jump through in order to use it.
     Webspiration is the last one I evaluated.  I have used the regular software package for Inspiration for over 10 years now and I think it is excellent.  I had already tried Webspiration last year when it was in it's beta phase and it was working nicely but I ran into 2 problems: 1) It required email addresses for accounts and 2) It was going to be expensive once the 30 day trial had expired.  Looking at their website, it looks like they eliminated the need for students to have email accounts with their School Subscription structure in which they designate a Webspiration Classroom administrator who sets up and manages faculty and student accounts.  The problem that still exists is the cost...$9 per account.  That could really add up if you used it for a lot of students.  Webspiration itself is an excellent mind mapper.  It is easy to use while manipulating your various idea bubbles, inserting pictures (either from gallery, from file, or online), and it has an amazing amount of formatting options which help make your mind map look great.  It even has it's popular Outline view which creates an outline behind the scenes as you form your mind map.  The collaboration capability worked really well but you had to make sure that you limited the amount of users who were actually trying to add things to the mind map because sometimes it froze and other times it was chaotic trying to figure out what was being added to the mind map.  All that said, I know we wouldn't use it because of the cost (and we already have the offline version of Inspiration).