Generate Sort Connect Elaborate
Concept-mapping routine, generate, sort by centrality, connect, elaborate.
Making connectionsUncovering complexityFacilitated
What is Generate Sort Connect Elaborate?
A concept-map routine. We capture the four steps as text fields here; drawing the actual map happens on paper or whiteboard.
Setup: Topic or concept to map.
The prompts
- 1GENERATE · initial ideas (one per line)
- 2SORT · which are central, which are tangential?
- 3CONNECT · which ideas connect, and how?
- 4ELABORATE · what new ideas extend or build on these?
Good moments for Generate Sort Connect Elaborate
- Classroom warm-upSurface what students bring before introducing new content.
- After a reading or videoConsolidate big ideas without testing recall.
- Discussion starterResponses become the seed material for the room conversation.
- End-of-session reflectionCapture how thinking changed.
About Visible Thinking
Visible Thinking Routines were developed by Project Zero at the Harvard Graduate School of Education (Ron Ritchhart, David Perkins). They are short structured protocols for surfacing thinking, not assessments.
Project Zero website