Web 2.0 Tool Review: Flowchart.com!

Name: Flowchart.com
URL: http://www.flowchart.com/
Category: Critical thinking/problem solving tool

Description: Flowchart.com is a Web 2.0 tool that gives the user tools for making a flowchart.  This application provides basic tools for easily assembling a new flowchart, as well as more advanced tools to enhance the visual appeal and versatility of the flowchart tool.
To the right of the work area, you will find a set of tools for drawing shapes (e.g. the rectangles and rhombuses typically used in flow charts), and tools for drawing lines and arrows to connect the boxes to form a flow chart.  You can add captions to the flowchart elements by right clicking. 
To the left of the work area, you find four menus.  The first menu is for clipart, and includes many images that can add visual appeal and customization to your flowchart.  The second menu is titles "Flowchart Symbols," and includes many specialized flowchart symbols, such as you would find in specialized, technical fields like engineering.  The third menu item is for scripts, which would be for users proficient in coding and Javascript (which I am not).  The fourth menu is for templates, pre-made flowcharts that you can customize as you wish.  The templates are useful as a time saver, and for giving the user ideas on different uses for flowchart.com. 
You can save you flowchart as either a bitmap (.png), pdf document, or vector image (.svg).  In addition to saving a still image of your flowchart, there is a record button that allows you to record your activities in the flowchart editor. 

Also significant, flowchart.com allows for online collaboration.

What do you need to know before using this tool?
No specialized knowledge or skill is needed to use most features of this tool.  The script options would require some knowledge of code and or Javascript (I'm guessing here since I don't know those things myself), but scripts are not essential for using the tool.  Many of the symbols in the flowchart symbols menu require specialized or technical knowledge to use correctly, but presumably they are only going to be used by those in specialized fields anyway.  

What do you need to have before using this tool?
You need an internet connection and a web browser.  Flowchart.com works in any internet browser and requires no software downloading.

How could flowchart.com be used in teaching?
In biology, flowchart.com would be ideal for mapping out metabolic pathways.  In college general biology classes, students are frequently required to learn a variety of metabolic pathways (e.g. anaerobic glycolysis, aerobic respiration, photosynthesis).  In teaching these pathways, the teacher must make a decision on how much detail to include in their presentation to the students.  The textbook has diagrams and flowcharts of these metabolic pathways that usually include either more detail or less detail than the teacher intends to show.  Using flowchart.com, a teacher can assemble their own diagram of, for example, the light reactions of photosynthesis, including exactly those details they expect the students to learn.  I'm actually teaching photosynthesis and respiration right now, and that is why I chose to review this particular tool this week.
Flowchart.com would also be excellent for diagraming ecological processes, such as food webs, trophic structures, and chemical cycles.  The clipart art would be useful for illustrating the steps in the cycles, although it might be necessary for the teacher to import their own images in some cases.

Life cycle diagrams could also be generated using flowchart.com.  This would be useful for teaching about parasites such as flukes and tapeworms.  It would also useful for teaching about species that undergo various forms of alternation of generations, like plants, algae, and fungi; and for teaching about cnidarians that alternate between polyp and medusa body forms in their lifecycle.

Phylogenetic trees, basically family trees for species, are a natural application for flowchart.com.  The templates include a family tree that can be used directly for this purpose.  You would simply substitute taxonomic categories in place of people.  I will give an example of this in my next post.

The basic tools within flowchart.com are simple enough to use that a teacher could probably give students a short tutorial and have them generating flowcharts within a single lab period.  There is a wide range of possible lab projects a class could engage in using flowchart.com.  The online collaborative feature of the tool could be particularly useful here, in that it would allow students at different computers to work on one flowchart as a team.  

Dichotomous keys are used for identifying specimens.  They are basically flowcharts consisting of a two choice questions.  For example, a dichotomous key of mammals would have questions like "Are there six incisors in the lower jaw, or less than six?" or "Are lophodont teeth present?"  Once you answer enough questions, you should eliminate all possibilities except the species that your specimen actually represents.  Flowchart.com is exactly the tool one would use to build a dichotomous key.  I have taught labs where students consturct dichotomous keys for insects and drew their keys on poster paper, usually after making a rough draft on scratch paper.  That same lab exercise could be done in a computer equipped lab using flowchart.com. 

It's also possible for a teacher to construct a dichotomous key that the students could use for a lab exercise.  I once did a lab where students were assigned to identify what kind of animal (or wind) pollinated a particular flower specimen, based on flower morphology.  I don't have a copy of the dichotomous key we used then, but I could make a new one by doing some research and using flowchart.com.

What are the advantages of using this tool in a teaching environment?
Flowchart.com is very versatile, even if you limit yourself to the basic functions that are simple enough for most students to master quickly.  Teaching students about non-linear processes virtually demands some kind of graphical illustration.  Words and text are not enough.  Thus, flowchart.com serves an essential instructional technique.
The multi-user collaborative feature of the tool is a great advantage for group projects.

What are the disadvantages of using this tool in a teaching environment?
I'm a little surprised the chemistry clipart included cartoon lab equipment, but not any chemical symbols that would be useful for writing complex chemical reactions and or metabolic pathways.  Granted, ball and stick molecules could be made using the geometric shapes available.
The clipart includes an image of a scantily clad mermaid (not obscene), which could be a problem with elementary or secondary school classes.  I don't know if there are any other risque images in the collection.