7th Grade Math in MN: Days 10,11,12

Week 3
Day 10: Lesson 5 - Dot Plots & Stat Questions
Day 11: Lesson 5 & 6 - Histograms
Day 12: Lesson 6 - Histograms & Desmos Polygraph

It was a great week of discussions about data.

Day 10: We started with a review of what makes a "good statistical question."  I then made the decision to skip lesson 4, as dot plots are not really a 7th grade MN standard and we need to get to histograms, box plots, measures of center, and measures of variability.

So we jumped to lesson 5.  We did the warm up, which required some calculations with percents.  Since I am jumping into the middle of the 6th grade curriculum, the curriculum assumes the students can do percents.  Since I am actually at the beginning of this year, we did the warm up together so we could review how to calculate percents.

In 6th grade, the students do many factor puzzles.  They get pretty comfortable solving these.  So I use that throughout 7th grade to help set up any problem that can be solved proportionally.

The four part box is their setup for factor puzzles.  We put in the 3 red numbers and solve for the number that ended up green as the percent.  All the while we emphasize percent means out of 100.  Most of the students remembered pretty quick, and the new ones caught on really quick.

We finished this day with a discussion of Activity 1 and another percent problem  With this problem I wish there was another number of dots besides 3.  It could easily lead to confusion.

Day 11:

We started with the glorious discussion starter problem in Lesson 5.  There are 2 dot plots and the students are given 5 statements and they have to figure out if they agree or disagree with the statements.  It led to wonderful discussions, as most problems in this curriculum do.  

We then jumped to Activity 1 of Lesson 6.  We started just by examining the given histogram and asking students to THINK-PAIR-SHARE "what do you notice? what do you wonder?"  Ideally I would have ave them stand first, but again, time is short.  However we still got the students to notice and wonder all the right things about histograms.  

We then ended the day by answering the five questions about the histogram.  Most students did it with little problems after our great notice/wonder conversation.  

Day 12:

We plan to finish up Lesson 6 and histograms on this day.  Based mostly around a compare/contrast of dot plots and histograms.  

We will then create our first histogram together in class.  

If there is time we will follow up with a DESMOS polygraph on histograms.  

This should wrap up a marvelous week of statistical discussions in 7th grade math!

Downloads:

Google doc link to my student facing Lesson 5.

PDF link to my student facing Lesson 5.

Google doc link to my student facing Lesson 6. 

PDF link to my student facing Lesson 6.