Activity #3: Exemplary, Equitable, Constructivist Lesson

Here is the lesson I chose: http://www.nsa.gov/academia/_files/collected_learning/high_school/statistics/typical_american_student.pdf

In this lesson, students will use graphing calculators to interpret data collected in class. With this data and the calculators, students will find the mean, median, mode, summary statistics, bar graphs, box and whiskers plot and scatterplots. Students will then report their findings in a summary letter.

Common Core standards addressed: 

• CCSS.Math.Content.8.SP.A.1
 Construct and interpret scatter plots for bivariate measurement data to investigate patterns of association between two quantities. Describe patterns such as clustering, outliers, positive or negative association, linear association, and nonlinear association.

• CCSS.Math.Content.8.SP.A.2
 Know that straight lines are widely used to model relationships between two quantitative variables. For scatter plots that suggest a linear association, informally fit a straight line, and informally assess the model fit by judging the closeness of the data points to the line.

By the end of the lesson, students will be able to: 
collect datafind the mean, median, mode and summary statistics for their datacreate a bar graph, box and whiskers plot and scatterplotinterpret the datasummarize the data
Materials needs: 
activity sheetsmeasuring tapeTI-83 graphing calculators

This lesson is exemplary, constructivist and equitable for the following reasons:

• students work collaboratively to collect and interpret data (Jonassen, 35)

• even though the goal is to learn these methods for interpreting statistics, this lesson allows them to  branch out into whatever connections they relate to according to the data collected (Jonassen, 35)

• it allows time to reflect while collecting, processing and summarizing the data (Jonassen, 35)

• the teacher is more of a mentor/coach throughout the lesson while the students are learning together and teaching each other; teacher's role is to monitor, answer and ask probing questions and facilitate the use of technology(Jonassen, 37)

• all students will be provided with a graphing calculator to make it equitable and also the tasks are meaningful and difficult to do without the graphing capability (Chapman, 1)

• students are each given a role which will help with equity as well and, hopefully, escape the gender stereotypes that may occur (Chapman, 3)

• the use of technology allows students to dive deeper into the data and their reflections on interpreting the data whereas, without the technology, most of the time would be spent on the simple graphing and calculations (Jonassen, 35) (Kozma, 181-182)
• data collected relates to the students' lives and the students themselves (Jonassen, 35)