Sacha Muller   

Title:  Data Gathering Introduction

Content Area:  Understanding and representing concepts of data

Grade Level: 1

Material Needed:  rulers paper, graph paper. (anything the students request, this is very open ended.)

Key Concepts:  data gathering and analysis

EALR’s:  Benchmark one part 4

• use reading, listening, and observation skills to access and extract mathematical information from a variety of sources such as pictures, diagrams, physical models, classmates, oral narratives, and symbolic representations
• follow a plan for collecting information
• express ideas using mathematical language and notation such as physical or pictorial models, tables, charts, graphs, or symbols

Grade Level Expectations:  Statistics

• 1.4.3 Understand how data can be collected and organized.
• Use physical objects or pictures to build bar graphs.
• Organize objects into groups before counting them.
• 1.4.5 Understand how a display provides information.
• Answer questions about graphs (e.g., how many cats? How many dogs?).

Goals:  Given very basic guidelines, students will get into groups and come up with something to gather data on and someway to represent that data.  Students will report out their data gathering techniques and their data representation. 

Objective:

Procedure:

·        Introduction/Preassessment

Today we are going to look at some ways to gather data and to represent that data.  Does anyone know what we mean when we say data? (Activating Prior Knowledge) Right, it is usually a collection of numbers that are related, the same measurement of something.               

What are some things that get measured regularly? 

What are some things that we might be able to measure today in the classroom?  How can we do that?  How will we record the data?  What will the units be:  inches, feet, days, weeks, number of red shoes, people who like vanilla? Can anything be a data category?   Sure. 

Today we are going to get into groups and gather data on something. It could be a measurement; it could be another type of attribute like who eats cereal for breakfast.  Then we are going to present this data.  What are some ways we can present data?  Bar graphs, pictographs, pie charts, number lines, line plot, just in its compiled form.  There are many ways, and give and example of each for each one.       

What you are going to do is get into groups of three.  In your groups you will decide what you will collect data on.  You will collect the data.  When are deciding try to get some thing that will give you at least ten data points.  In other words if you are going to do hair color or shoe size in inches, you will have to have ten people to gather data from.   By the way we also have some rulers here if you need them for data gathering. You will decide how to present the data.  When you are gathering data from people you will need to write their names down next to the data you gathered to help you remember not to ask the same person twice.   You can be creative, but you must be able to show that your presentation represents the data you have collected.  There are paper and art supplies here to create your representation of the data. 

Does everyone understand what we are doing?  Can someone tell the class what we are doing?  You will have about half an hour to gather data and create the representation.  After that we will spend about 15 minutes discussing your various findings.  Does anyone need anything clarified?  OK please start. 

·        Activity

o       Students are in groups forming a question and gathering data. The teacher goes to each group to observe, question, and suggest.

·        Closure:  Groups report out with findings and methods.

·        Post Assessment:  during independent work time students are to take some data off of the board, Birthdays and dates of class members, and represent it back to me.  This can be graphically or in writing.