Dear parent or guardian: This is a summary of the key ideas your child is learning in mathematics.

You can use this summary as background as you support your child’s work. Some suggestions for
simple activities you can do with your child are also included.

Sorting and Classifying Data

1
What Is Sorting?
You sort when you organize things into different groups.
For example, if you are looking at clothes, you might sort the clothes into shirts and
other kinds of clothes. You can use a sorting circle to show your sorting.

Clothing

Shirts

Items that fit the sorting rule are shown inside the sorting circle, and items that do
not fit the rule are shown outside the circle.

How Can You Use Two Sorting Rules at the Same Time?
Objects can be sorted in different ways. Sometimes, two sorting rules can be used at
the same time.

For example, shapes can be sorted by whether they are round and by whether they
are blue. Some shapes are round and blue, some are just round, some are just blue,
and some are neither round nor blue.

© 2021 Rubicon Publishing Inc. Grade 2 • Collecting and Organizing Data 1

 1 Sorting and Classifying Data (continued)

How Can You Show the Results of Your Sorting?

When you sort with two sorting rules, you can use a Venn diagram with two
overlapping circles to help show what you did.

There are 4 separate sections in a Venn diagram with two overlapping circles:
• Things that fit one rule but not the other go inside one circle only.
• Things that fit both rules go inside the overlapping part of the circles.
• Things that don’t fit either rule go outside the circles.

For example, in the Venn diagram below, some toys have been sorted by whether
they are used by toddlers and whether they are toys you ride.

Toys A kitchen playset is a

toddler toy, so it is in
Toddler toys Toys you ride this circle.

You ride a skateboard,

so it is in this circle.

A tricycle is a toddler
toy and you ride it,
so it is in both circles.

A dartboard is not a
toddler toy and you
do not ride it, so it
isn’t in either circle.

It is okay for a Venn diagram to have an empty section. For example, if you
use a Venn diagram to sort animals and plants, there would be nothing in the
overlapping section.

You can also use a Carroll diagram to show the same thing. A Carroll diagram is a
chart with two rows and two columns:
• The first column includes items that fit a particular sorting rule, and the second
column shows items that do not fit the rule.
• The first row shows items that fit a different sorting rule, and the second row
shows items that do not fit that rule.

For example, the same information from the Venn diagram can be shown in a
Carroll diagram.
Toddler toys Not toddler toys

Toys you ride

Toys you
do not ride

© 2021 Rubicon Publishing Inc. Grade 2 • Collecting and Organizing Data 2

 1 Sorting and Classifying Data (continued)

Helping Your Child

Encourage your child to tell you different ways you might sort items found at home,
such as clothing or food. You can even have your child consider more than one idea
at a time, for example, whether the food goes into the fridge and also whether you
bought it at the grocery store.

Definitions
Carroll diagram: a table with two rows and two columns that is used to sort data

sort: to put together things that belong with one another for some reason

sorting rule: the rule you use to put certain items together when you sort them

Venn diagram: a diagram, often one or more circles, showing how a set of items
might be sorted by different attributes; when circles overlap, items belong in one of
the two circles, in the overlapping section, or outside both circles

© 2021 Rubicon Publishing Inc. Grade 2 • Collecting and Organizing Data 3