Newsletter August 2007

Volume 1, Issue 1 Math 6 Unit 1 Data Analysis

Dear Parents,
Welcome to the 2007-2008 school year! We are eager to work with you and your students as we learn
new mathematical concepts. The State of Georgia is introducing Performance Standards that call for
students to be actively engaged in doing math in order to learn math. In the classroom, students will
frequently work on tasks and activities to discover and apply mathematical thinking. Students will be
expected to explain or justify their answers and to write clearly and properly.
Mathematical content will be organized in units based on the content of the Georgia Performance
Standards (GPS). Since most textbooks published before the adoption of the new standards do not
contain all the topics addressed in the new GPS, the teacher will be providing content notes in class
and supplementing practice through tasks. When appropriate, problems will be assigned from the text.
Unit 1 Data Analysis involves collecting and interpreting data. As we study this unit, your student will
learn to recognize numerical and categorical data and determine how best to organize and display
each type of data. Your student will conduct their own survey, organize the data in a frequency table
or line plot, and display the data in a bar graph, pictograph, histogram, stem and leaf or line
graph.

Ways Parents Can Help: Vocabulary:

Here are some activities you and your
student can do together:
Read charts, tables, and graphs in
newspapers and magazines. Discuss
the information that each display shows.
Collect data about your student’s
favorite sport and make a graph
showing how a team is doing over time
or a graph showing how various teams
performed last season.
Take an inventory of something in your
house (perhaps the types of groceries in
your pantry). Organize the information in
a frequency table.
Conduct a survey on your street. (What
colors of cars do people drive?)
Organize your data, display it, and
discuss how this information might be
used.
Data: The facts or numbers that describe
something.
● Categorical- describes a quality such as a
person’s gender, race, or religion
● Numerical-gives the count (number of
cars) or a measurement (height, scores).
Frequency table: A chart for organizing data. It
shows the number of times each item appears.
For more vocabulary help, visit:
http://intermath.coe.uga.edu/
Textbook connection:
Holt Mathematics Course 1:
Chapter 6:
Lessons 4, 5, 7, 9
Online:
http://go.hrw.com/gopages/index.html -Holt Site
http://nlvm.usu.edu/en/nav/category_g_3_t_5.html
http://nces.ed.gov/NCESKIDS/Graphing
www.usatoday.com/news/snapshot.htm
 Lyric Letters Line Plot Activity
Choose a song and print out the lyrics. Use the line below to construct a line
plot showing how often each letter occurs in the chorus of the song. For example,
every time you see the letter “a” in the chorus, put an X over the letter “a” below. Do
this for all the letters in the chorus of your favorite song. After you have finished
constructing your line plot, answer the questions that follow. Have fun!

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a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z

1.) What 3 letters occur the most in your song lyric chorus?

2.) Which letters do not occur at all?

3.) Which two letters occur the same number of times in your lyrics? (Choose a
pair of letters that at least occur once)

4.) Why do you think some letters occur more than others?

5.) Before you made your line plot, which three letters did you think would occur
the most?

6.) Which three letters did you think would occur the least?

7.) How many of letter “h” occurred?

8.) How many of letter “e” occurred?