Lesson 9

The mathematical purpose of this lesson is to create data displays and calculate statistics using technology. Students encounter the term statistic which is a quantity that is calculated from sample data. In this lesson students will enter data into a spreadsheet, find statistics, and create box plots using technology. The work of this lesson connects to previous work because students have been creating data displays and interpreting statistics without technology. The work of this lesson connects to upcoming work because students will make decisions about what statistics are appropriate after using technology to create displays so they can see the shape of a distribution. When students investigate and explain how changing values in a data set effects the mean and the median they are engaging in MP8 because they are looking for and expressing regularity in repeated reasoning.

Acquire devices that can run GeoGebra (recommended) or other spreadsheet technology. It is ideal if each student has their own device. (A GeoGebra Spreadsheet is available under Math Tools.)

Students require access to data collected from survey questions in a previous lesson and also spreadsheet technology. It is recommended that the geogebra spreadsheet and one-variable stats tools be used, which is part of the math tools provided with the digital version of these materials and also available at https://www.geogebra.org/classic/spreadsheet. If you opt to use a different type of tool that can find summary statistics and create histograms and box plots, you may need to develop alternative technology instructions for your students.