The Problem

Many students say they have difficulty with math.

 Hector says, “He can’t do math and never will be able to.”

Help Hector! Convince him he can do math!

Introduction

Do you find math difficult? Many students feel they just cannot do math. Some people feel that anyone can learn and it is about how you are taught. Some people feel math is its own language and once we learn it, we can do it! In our own class, there are many students who struggle with this! We can look at three class’ statistics, including your own just from our school.

Tasks

1.  You will take a survey to find out how other students feel about math.

2.  You will create a digital presentation to create a dot plot and find the measures of center, and possible outliers from our data.

3.  You will create a box plot and find the upper and lower quartiles.

4.  You will create a frequency table and a histogram using our data.

5.  Propose solutions.

   Process

Resources

Your finished product should identify the following 6 steps:

1. Define the problem   (Math Difficulty)
2. Gather evidence       (Gathered survey)
3. Identify causes       (Based on the info from survey)
4. Evaluate a policy      (Look at resources/videos)
5. Develop solutions
6. Select best solution

Period 1:

1.  Open link on Padlet and type in your last report grade grade from last marking period ONLY: https://ms210q.padlet.org/moleary/w7gp6z9q6c2vvt60

2.  Take survey: Math Difficulty (google.com)

3.  Find the measures of center for your class (Look at Padlet link for data)

Period 2: Using Google slides create:

1.   Create a dot plot with this data, find any outliers, and describe the spread, shape, and center of the data distribution.

Period 3:

1.  Create a box plot with this data, find the lower and upper quartiles, and the interquartile range (IQR)

Period 4:

1.  Create a frequency table and a histogram using this data.

Period 5:

1.  Analyze data from Google Form and Padlet

●    I will show you data from the Google Form for all 3 classes

2.  Looking at Google Form’s first question, find the measures of center on how students rate math.

a.  What is the measure of center that best describes this data?

3.  Observe problems

Period 6:

1.  Watch these videos: 

●    https://youtu.be/V6yixyiJcos

●    https://youtu.be/Wpf1AwRRAR0

●    https://youtu.be/LFR3J9KQsNo

2.  Additional Resources:

●    Dr. Jo Boaler: "Anyone Can Learn Math" - NapaLearns

●    Why Mathematics Is a Language (thoughtco.com)

●    Overcoming Test Anxiety in High School | Edutopia

●    Reduce Test Anxiety in Middle School | Test Anxiety Tips for Tweens | Understood

3.  Come up with solutions based on the data

Evaluation

Conclusion

In this unit, we learned about the many students who find math difficult and based on our gathered data we were able to provide some solutions that can support students to not find math so difficult.

Digital Project: Students study data in classes at their school by analyzing answers to surveys. They created a digital presentation to observe the data findings and propose solutions.

Standards

6SP4: Students will use a box plot and measures of spread to describe a data set.

6SP4: Students will display data in a histogram.

6SP5: Students will use measures of center to describe a data set.

6SP5c: Students will summarize and display numeric data.

Math: Represent real-world and mathematical problems by using statistics to graph our data in multiple forms.

6W5: (ELA): Conduct research to answer questions, including self-generated questions, drawing on several sources and refocusing the inquiry when appropriate

(SS):  Describe and analyze arguments of others, with support.