Webbing is a strategy blending traditional outlining with target mapping. Creating a web begins with a central idea -- your topic at its broadest. The second level of a web -- connected by straight lines to the central circle -- visualizes the next level of associations. For example, if your central idea is "Bears," information on the next level might include "Food," "Habitat," "Kinds" and "Appearance." Each of these items on the second level then inspire new ideas, like "Grizzly," "Black," "Brown" and "Polar" beside "Kinds."
Students who benefit most from webbing are visual learners; aural learners will also value spoken presentations of webbed information. Webbing allows all students to think outside the box and see patterns in ideas that they might not otherwise observe. Additionally, it cultivates a mindset of curiosity, encouraging students to investigate links, relationships and similarities. Webbing helps students, struggling with thinking conceptually, examine how pieces of information fit together, instead of just memorizing raw data without fitting it into the bigger picture.
Brainstorming -- a method of detailing information and relationships via free-flow thinking -- is an important component of webbing. Once free-associations and information is detailed through brainstorming, webbing creates a dynamic outline that organizes and makes sense of the information. Webs are also created by clustering (grouping similar things), outlining (arranging main ideas according to relationship), or trend-spotting (looking at things that behave similarly).
While webbing is primarily thought of as a teaching technique that allows teachers to interact with concepts with students, it has other uses as well. Writers use webbing to visually flesh out concepts and themes in their books. Teachers use webbing in classroom prep -- even if they don't actually use webbing in the classroom -- to ensure they are thoroughly presenting materials. Executives use webbing in presentations to explain concepts to both employees and customers. In fact, webbing is useful in virtually every circumstance where a visual representation of the relationship of ideas is needed.