| Introducing
ICT
Over the preceding five week period time had
been devoted to teaching the skills necessary for this data handling activity.
| Key
Skills for Information Workshop |
| Children
need to be able to: |
| Create a new record
in the database |
Click Edit
then choose the Insert record
option |
| Enter information into
a record on the database |
Use the keywords
option to limit children's choices. |
| Save new records that
have been entered |
|
Click this icon. |
| Use the graphing tool
to produce and print a range of graphs |
|
Click this icon and then choose the
field(s) to be graphed and the type of graph required |
The database was a very simple one, consisting of
only two fields: surface
and height. The children entered
their record of the height the ramp had been lifted to against the surface
that was being tested.
All the data was entered into the database and saved.
The children wanted a graph that they could use to answer the question
'which surface has the most friction?'
Information Workshop was able to quickly draw a number of different types
of graph.
Much time was given to discussing these graphs. Although
they all looked attractive, the children realised that some of the graphs
could not be used to answer their question.
The children eventually selected the bar graph to
represent their results. There was still the need to reinforce the fact
that the surface with the most friction was the one which needed the ramp
to be raised the highest.
| Interpreting
and analysing information in graphs |
| Children should
be given opportunities to discuss different types of graphs and
the information they contain.
Bar graphs show how things
compare.
Pie graphs show how things
divide.
Histograms (frequency graphs)
count occurrences.
Line graphs show continuously
varying data.
Scatter graphs show relationships
between variables.
ICT can play a key role in helping children discover the appropriateness
of a particular type of graph. Clearly, a number of the graphs shown
above do not contain useful information and are not appropriate
to answer the type of question the children were asking. |
Using
the Sort tool in Information Workshop
meant that we could display the bars of the graph in order of the
height of the ramp. This helped the children decide which surface
had the most friction.
|
|
| The
dialog box initially caused the children some problems because although
they could select the field they found it hard to interpret the sort
order arrows. To sort the data from largest to smallest, they needed
to choose the downwards arrow. |
|
|
