Are you a Data Detective???

This week, we began our Statistics unit.  We are using the ‘Data Detective’ model as our base for our investigations.  The investigative cycle involves: Problem, Plan, Data, Analysis and Conclusions.  Statisticians use this cycle and we think that it is important that we should begin to as well.

Using real data means that real investigations can be carried out. Because the data is real, there is probably more than one story that can be told by the data.  Exploring stories in real data helps to make the process more meaningful and relevant for children.  Our first investigation was on the colour of cars that passed SFX church for 10 minutes using a tally chart.  Before we created our tally chart, we wrote down some ‘I wonder...’ questions, and when we returned, we wrote some ‘I noticed...’ statements.  Next week, we will transfer this data into a simple bar or column graph. Our results...we noticed that white cars were the most popular coloured car, and green was the least favoured colour.  This is the first of several investigations.  We had loads of fun learning about using data in a meaningful way.