Shared Spreadsheets

Typically the students that enter my classroom each year need help with interpreting graphs, so our class is investigating how we can use technology to bridge that knowledge/skills gap.

First of all our media specialist asked if we had any classroom data that she could use to create a spreadsheet. Since we are investigating Unit Five/Six of Everyday Math (our district-approved math curriculum), we used "old-school" data and graphs (data that was collected using paper and pencil work, organized into pre-organized tables, then transformed into bar/pie graphs in student workbooks with colored pencils) to make a Microsoft Spreadsheet, then used the Chart Wizard to make a specified graph. This progression seemed to be successful because the students had already used the probability/graphing skills in class for math and could now compare what they had created "old school" with "new school" techniques.

Going one step further was adding the collaborative/interactive nature of collecting data. During math the class investigated the "fairness" of a game, and collected data on who won each day. That data was then entered "old school" into a table, but then the same data was entered online on Google Docs by each student partnership. The students loved watching their data appear in real time and many conversations erupted as the student stance on the game being fair or unfair was proven by the results of other members of the class. We continued collecting and entering data for five days until we were able to create a graph online and all view it together. We are now posting responses to the graphs on the wiki.

Some things to remember:
-Define the coordinates for each partnership beforehand to ensure that someone does not accidentally overwrite another groups data. I gave a stickynote to each partnership with their coordinates to their field written down so that the partners would remember where their row was located each day.
-Remember to give some extra time for initial experimentation so students can see their responses appear in real time.
-Remind students that this spreadsheet is accessible to the world, so no first or last names should be used.