Our World in Data

St Nicholas School - Alphaville Guðrún Ingimundardóttir, Alexandre Velasquez

IB MYP English Phases 2, 3 (Grade 7)

Summary

Our World in Data

Subject Year Start date Duration

English Grade 7 Week 1, June 4 weeks 16 hours

Description
This unit deals with data literacy, and how we express our understanding of the data we find in the world around us. We will look
at how to organise our ideas according to recognised systems, look at what language is used to describe data, and examine our
relationship with the numbers and information that make the world go round.

Key and Related Concepts

Key Concepts

Key
Concepts Definition

Logic is a method of reasoning and a system of principles used to build arguments and reach conclusions.

Logic

Systems are sets of interacting or interdependent components. Systems provide structure and order in human,
natural and built environments. Systems can be static or dynamic, simple or complex.
Systems

Related Concept(s)

Phase 3 - Conventions, Meaning

Inquiry

Conceptual Understanding

An understanding of systems and logic is further enhanced by an appreciation of conventions that inform systems, and meaning
which can impact on our logical reasoning.

Global Context

Global Context Explorations to develop

Systems, Methods

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Our World in Data
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St Nicholas School - Alphaville Guðrún Ingimundardóttir, Alexandre Velasquez

IB MYP English Phases 2, 3 (Grade 7)

Global Context Explorations to develop

Scientific and
technical innovation

Identify a specific global context exploration.

Students are engaged in this inquiry in order to understand better how data can impact their lives, but also in order to understand
data better in order to be able to draw logical conclusions, formulate hypotheses based on observations, as well as interpret
collected data.

Statement of Inquiry

The advancement and sharing of scientific knowledge relies on a system of conventions used to communicate the meaning of
data and information.

Inquiry Questions

Type Inquiry Questions Line of Inquiry

Factual What do we mean by data? Systems

Conceptual Why do we rely on conventions to Conventions

communicate our understanding of
data?

Conceptual Why do we say "interpret" data? Aren't Meaning

facts facts?

Factual Why kinds of systems of writing/ Conventions

communicating are used to report
data?

Debatable Do data and information always lead to Logic

knowledge?

Conceptual How do we use data responsibly? Meaning

Factual What can data tell us about the world? Meaning/systems

Curriculum

Aims

Enable the student to develop multiliteracy skills through the use of a range of learning tools, such as multimedia, in the
various modes of communication

Enable the student to recognize and use language as a vehicle of thought, reflection, self-expression and learning in other
subjects, and as a tool for enhancing literacy

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Our World in Data
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St Nicholas School - Alphaville Guðrún Ingimundardóttir, Alexandre Velasquez

IB MYP English Phases 2, 3 (Grade 7)

MYP subject group objective(s)

Phase

C Speaking

Capable level (phase 3 and 4)

i.use a wide range of vocabulary

ii.use a wide range of grammatical structures generally accurately

iii.use clear pronunciation and intonation in a comprehensible manner

iv.communicate all the required information clearly and effectively

D Writing

Capable level (phase 3 and 4)

i.use a wide range of vocabulary

ii.use a wide range of grammatical structures generally accurately

iii.organize information effectively and coherently in an appropriate format using a wide range of simple and complex
cohesive devices

iv.communicate all the required information with a clear sense of audience and purpose to suit the context

Content (topics, knowledge, skills)

Students will know:

How to interpret data from various sources (statistics, infographics, unprocessed data)
How to present data in different ways (multimodality) in a way that supports understanding
How to present data, information, and research to different audiences (visual supports)
How to use graphic organisers to write a scientific report
How to use formal language (including appropriate sentence starters, cohesive devices, and verb tenses)
How to use different modal verbs to express probability
How to use 0, 1st and second conditionals to express probability.

Skills

Ability to interpret and communicate their understanding of data, as well as their ability to access different types of multimedia
resources (multimodal literacy), and draw reasonable conclusions based on their understanding thereof.

ATL Skills

ATL skills

Communication

- I. Communication skills

Exchanging thoughts, messages and information effectively through interaction

Use a variety of speaking techniques to communicate with a variety of audiences

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St Nicholas School - Alphaville Guðrún Ingimundardóttir, Alexandre Velasquez

IB MYP English Phases 2, 3 (Grade 7)

Research

- VI. Information literacy skills

Finding, interpreting, judging and creating information

Access information to be informed and inform others

Thinking

- VIII. Critical thinking skills

Analysing and evaluating issues and ideas

Interpret data

- X. Transfer skills

Utilizing skills and knowledge in multiple contexts

Make connections between subject groups and disciplines

Developing IB Learners

IB Learner Profile

Inquirers

Knowledgeable

Description
Students will develop their inquiry skills by learning how to formulate arguments, develop generalisations, and practice observing
data in order to arrive at reasonable conclusions.

Students will work on being knowledgeable by considering data from a local and global perspective, and make connections
between their skills acquired in the hard sciences and the language and conventions used to communicate understanding of
scientific principles and data.

Integration

International Mindedness

Students will study trends in data, and how data can inform our understanding of global issues (what information can tell
us about the state of the world, effects of climate change, correlation and causation between different factors, and how
misinterpretation of data can cause damage to our scientific understanding.

Academic Integrity

Students will be required to cite all sources for their work, but also supported to understand the difference between using other

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IB MYP English Phases 2, 3 (Grade 7)

texts as models (for sentence starters and vocabulary for example) and copying or otherwise plagiarising content from others.

Connections

Language Development

This unit will help students develop their understanding of formal language, structured writing following appropriate conventions
for the purpose of communicating scientific knowledge, acquire structures such as conditionals and modal verbs to express
consequence and probability.

Information Communication Technology

Students will gather information from various online sources, but also practice setting up graphs and data using virtual platforms
and/or software, which will require ingenuity as well as problem-solving and noticing issues when performing data presentation.
Information literacy will also require of them to understand and select appropriate forms of presentation, and identify issues with
the presentation of multimedia information (how it is received by an audience).

Service as Action

Students can challenge themselves by exploring unfamiliar areas of data, but also use the acquired information to organise
successful and informed awareness-raising campaigns and bring attention to information that can impact our world as well as
people in order to provide service in the form of an informed debate.

Assessment

Formative Assessment

The following formative assessments will be carried out in order to assess the students' understanding of the skills and
knowledge covered:
- Reading comprehension tasks of conventional lab reports in order for students to appreciate both the structure and content of
academic writing used to communicate advances in knowledge

- Logical interpretation tasks where students look at infographics and interpret both verbally and in writing on the causes and
possible outcomes of the data they have using appropriate language structures, including transition words and modal verbs.

- Proposal of the lab report submitted in advance, in order to receive feedback on data collection methods

- Drafts of components of the lab report submitted in advance of the final report in order to practice certain language structures.

- Voice recordings submitted to the teacher prior to the speaking component in order to practice both pronunciation and
emphasis as well as language structures used for formal and academic commentary

- Perspective exercises where students consisder the meaning of data for different people in order to understand how it can
affect meaning.

Summative Assessment

Summative task #1 (to address Criterion B): Students will write a lab report based on independent research using appropriate
conventions including formal language, paragraph writing, modal verbs, conditionals, transition words, and appropriate content
as part of a lab report (aim, hypothesis, variables, method, conclusion etc.). This document should include a pictorial

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St Nicholas School - Alphaville Guðrún Ingimundardóttir, Alexandre Velasquez

IB MYP English Phases 2, 3 (Grade 7)

representation of their data in collaboration with mathematics and science so as to make the text multimodal and enhance the
communication of the report. This report should assess their logical understanding of data as well as their ability to communicate
meaning and address an audience using a system of data collection and contribute to an ever-growing body of scientific
knowledge (system).

Summative task #2 (to address Criterion C): Students will take part in an individual oral assessment where they receive
an infographic or other pictorial form of data representation and they will have to comment on it after a certain amount
of preparation (around 10 minutes per student). This assessment is designed both to prepare students for standard oral
assessments as part of language acquisition, but also to evaluate their understanding of and ability to use logic, their
understanding of systems of data collections as well as the meaning of the information.

MYP Assessment Criteria

N/A A: Listening N/A B: Reading

N/A C: Speaking N/A D: Writing

Description
Students will produce a lab report that accurately reports the process, method and results of a scientific experiment using
recognised conventions.

Students will comment on a multimedia prompt (infograph or statistics with caption) and comment on what they see and how
they interpret the information they are presented with.

Peer and Self-assessment

Students will be provided checklists and models in order to evaluate their work against established criteria. The unit will open
with a breakdown of a standard lab report in order to set the standard for what is ahead and allow them to deductively build
their understanding of a lab report.

For the speaking assessment, students will get the chance to evaluate each other's formative work and build their own set of
criteria as well as compare it against models so as to self-evaluate both the language part as well as the "performance part",
meaning how to respond to questions in a way that maximises their contribution to the discussion and uses appropriate filler
words for example.

Standardization and Moderation

As this is a unit that will be completed in close collaboration with Science and Maths, teachers will work together to standardise
the assessment based on the conventions brought in from each subject prior to the summative assessment getting carried out.
During the formative marking process as well as the preparation for the summative, teachers will evaluate each other's task
specific criteria and use sample assessments (spot check from the class curve) to match them with level descriptors.

Learning Experiences

Prior Learning Experiences

Students will have had experience with developing hypotheses (for example in Grade 6), and they will have had some practice
when it comes to interpreting data, both as part of their learning in Mathematics, as well as their preparation for the PYP

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St Nicholas School - Alphaville Guðrún Ingimundardóttir, Alexandre Velasquez

IB MYP English Phases 2, 3 (Grade 7)

exhibition. Their knowledge of paragraph writing and the use of transition words will also be something that will be built on as
part of this unit.

Learning Experiences and Teaching Strategies

Logic: Students will look at pictorial representations of data and statistics (infographics etc.), and logically interpret the causes
and consequences of the information using logic

Systems: Students will practice their comprehension of the systematic approach to collecting information through reading
comprehension work and interpretation of scientific experiments.

Conventions: They will also gain a better understanding of systems as part of academic and formal bodies of writing by
understanding the meaning and purpose of transition words through scaffolded composition task where they connect ideas as
part of a lab report in different ways in order to communicate different meanings. Students will also take part in games such
as versions of Among Us in order to find the impostor when it comes to connecting ideas in different ways so as to practice
information retrieval.

One of the key learning experiences, which will take place over several lessons will be the data collection process, where
students will gather data, record it, and later interpret it before communicating it in writing as part of their lab report. As they will
have considerable agency over their desired field to investigate, these learning experiences will take the form of action research,
surveys, observations etc. Each component of the lab report will be worked on individually in order to not only learn how to
structure the writing, but also to fully understand the meaning and importance of each.

Student Expectations

Students will have models at their disposal to understand and appreciate the appropriate format to be used to express their
understanding, and they will also be exposed to several ways in which they can collect data so that they understand their
responsibilities in terms of collecting the information.

Students will also understand expectations through a thorough discussion of the achievement levels for each of the
assessments, and they will be given opportunities to evaluate their work against them prior to handing in their work.

Feedback

In addition to the usual written feedback, particularly for tasks completed with minimal teacher supervision (due to the nature
of the task), students will also have to verbally present their research proposal to all teachers involved in the unit (Maths, Science,
English) in order to receive feedback and give teachers valuable information on their understanding prior to carrying out the final
research project and writing component for the first summative task.

Feedback for speaking tasks will be given both on a class basis, once the initial data has been gathered on spontaneous
speaking performance, and then individual performance will be given in the form of audio recordings in order to allow students
to make improvements to their pronunication and emphases in addition to the correct use of grammatical conventions.

Differentiation

As mentioned here above, the students will have considerable agency and autonomy in terms of carrying out their investigations,
so as to allow the more independent and advance students to advance at their own rhythm, while those in need of more support
or more concrete methods can receive further assistance or direction from their teacher. As for the speaking task, the prompts
will be varied to suit the abilities of each student while taking care to meet the learning objectives, and feedback will similarly
be tailored so as to support the students most in need of guidance while challenging others to continue pushing themselves
through differentiated questioning.

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