Concept mapping: A strategy for teaching and evaluation in nursing education

In the past decade an increasing emphasis has been placed on the importance of critical thinking in nursing. Nurse educators are faced with the challenge of finding ways to promote and evaluate critical thinking in nursing students, and various teaching strategies have been identified to achieve this goal. Concept maps are considered a powerful metacognitive tool that can facilitate the acquisition of knowledge through meaningful learning. Hence concept mapping can be used to promote and evaluate critical thinking. Based on the published nursing literature, the scope of concept mapping is discussed in this paper as a teaching and evaluation strategy for critical thinking in nursing education.