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Description: Tags: Snodgrass

The document discusses how educators are often inundated with student data but lack the tools to analyze and understand it. It argues that graphical data analysis techniques like stem-and-leaf plots can help educators more meaningfully organize and explore data to gain insights and improve instruction. These user-friendly visual methods provide concrete representations of performance patterns that numbers alone may obscure. With practice using these exploratory tools, educators can translate data insights into improved experiences for students.

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52 views15 pages

Description: Tags: Snodgrass

The document discusses how educators are often inundated with student data but lack the tools to analyze and understand it. It argues that graphical data analysis techniques like stem-and-leaf plots can help educators more meaningfully organize and explore data to gain insights and improve instruction. These user-friendly visual methods provide concrete representations of performance patterns that numbers alone may obscure. With practice using these exploratory tools, educators can translate data insights into improved experiences for students.

Uploaded by

anon-711290
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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You are on page 1/ 15

Turning Data into Information

Archived Information

John Snodgrass

1
Educators are constantly asked to
turn Data into Information.

Consider the array of data that educators


regularly confront:
ß State Proficiency Tests
ß National Achievement and Ability Tests
ß SAT, ACT, PSAT…etc.
ß NAEP
ß Diagnostic Assessments
ß High Stakes Graduation Tests

2
There are also:

ß Classroom assessments
ß Discipline records
ß Attendance records
ß Graduation rates
ß Demographic data like gender, ethnicity,
ß ...etc.

Educators are inundated with data, but this


does not necessarily mean that they have
information.

3
Data are Merely Numbers

To turn data into information, one must:

Organize the data

Describe the data

Interpret the data

4
Consider the Following Data
(Assume that these are test scores.)

n Abby 24 n Murray 30
n Barry 30 n Nuran 26
n Chloe 34 n Otis 22
n Dawann 28 n Perry 24
n Eric 28 n Qiana 38
n Fred 14 n Riley 32
n Gerry 36 n Sam 26
n Hannah 32 n Tanya 40
n Iyauna 30 n Ulrich 28
n Jason 28 n Vanessa 32
n Kathy 34 n Whitney 22
n Liron 30 n Yuri 26
n Zoltan 36

Typically, our data È looks like this.

5
We could compute the mean and the
standard deviation for the class. Numerical
displays are useful to the mathematically
experienced, but….
Some educators are not comfortable with the
algebraic operations that more traditional
statistical analysis techniques require.
Some educators may not readily discern patterns
of student performance in numerically
summarized data.
Some educators find interpreting a set of numbers
an abstract and unproductive process.
6
Graphical data analysis techniques are
a different way to manage data.

In order for school-based educators to


meaningfully organize and explore the
voluminous amounts of data they are presented
with each year, they need exposure to more
concrete and user friendly data analysis
techniques.

7
Moreover

For data analysis techniques to be valuable to


educators, the techniques must enhance the
chances that educators gain insight into student
performance and that they translate this insight
into improved educational experiences for children.

8
Graphical Data Analysis

Graphical data analysis methods are ideal for these


purposes. Graphical data analysis methods provide
school-based educators with concrete, clear and
powerful exploratory techniques around which they
can organize large and small sets of test scores into
meaningful representations of their building and
classroom realities.

9
Once educators have developed a concrete
understanding of the concepts underlying the
visual displays of information, a few well
placed numbers, such as a mean, a median, or
an interquartile range, can add specificity and
depth to educators’ understanding of the data.

10
Three good rules to follow when
turning data into information:

1. When confronted with a set of scores,


organize the scores numerically.
2. When comparing two or more sets of
scores, place the scores on the same
scale.
3. When graphing test scores, make sure
the visual display is an honest and
undistorted representation of the
numerical test scores.

11
In creating good visual displays,
it is important to:

1. Make sure the labels, titles and values on the visual


display are so complete and clear that the display is
understandable, independent of the narrative of the report.
2. Date every display.
3. Include the author’s name on each display.
4. Identify the specific source of the data presented on the
display.
5. Wherever possible, provide your audience with a
context for the data and points of comparison. For example,
you might discuss how the average of a particular class on
some given task compared with the average for the entire
district or how the same group of students performed in
previous years.

12
Data Should Not Be Viewed
in a Vacuum!

Stem-and-leaf plots are a particularly useful and user-friendly


data analysis technique.

Stem-and-leaf plots help educators graphically, rather than


mathematically, explore data in ways that can assist them in
making meaningful instructional decisions based on factual
information.

(This technique was developed by John Tukey, statistician emeritus


Bell Labs, and is promoted by the Quantitative Literacy Movement.)

13
Landwehr and Watkins point out that
exploratory data analysis techniques like
stem-and-leaf plots are designed to help
professionals reveal perhaps unexpected
“patterns and surprises”* within sets of
data.

*In their Preface to Exploring Data, Dale Seymour Publications, Palo Alto, 1986
14
Activity

Today we will use dot plots (which Landwehr


and Watkins call line plots) and stem-and-leaf
plots to explore a variety of data sets.

Let’s locate our handout packet and begin to


explore our topic, turning data into
information.
15

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