US Department of Commerce
Featured Activity: Population Change Over Time
Keep track of a state's population. After a brief discussion on how population data is used for funding, individuals look at population changes over time. Pupils find the population of two states using three different censuses. They then...
PBS
The Lowdown — Exploring Changing Obesity Rates through Ratios and Graphs
Math and medicine go hand-in-hand. After viewing several infographics on historical adult obesity rates, pupils consider how they have changed over time. They then use percentages to create a new graph and write a list of questions the...
Chicago Botanic Garden
Climate Change Around the World
Look at climate change around the world using graphical representations and a hands-on learning simulation specified to particular cities around the world. Using an interactive website, young scientists follow the provided...
US Department of Commerce
Immigration Nation
People come and people go. Given tabular census data on the annual number of immigrants from four different regions of the world between 2000 and 2010, pupils create double bar graphs and line graphs from the data. They analyze their...
Illustrative Mathematics
The High School Gym
Learners apply critical thinking skills as they analyze data about the temperature inside a gymnasium during a school assembly. The focus is on representing temperature as a function of time and interpreting input and output values...
PBS
Real-World Proportional Relationships: Gender Wage Gap
When will the gender wage gap disappear? Scholars use a provided infographic to see trends in wage gap over time. They use ratios of women's wages to men's wages to determine which decades had the greatest change in the wage gap. The...
Mathalicious
XBOX Xpotential
Touchdown! This is an exponentially insightful lesson that explores the growth of football games with different video game consoles. Class members discuss whether the increase of mergahertz can be described as linear or exponential....
Rainforest Alliance
Investments in Forest Carbon
One hundred metric tons of CO2 can accumulate in one acre of forest over time—that's a lot of carbon! In the activity, groups of middle school learners determine what makes forests important. They then solidify the concept by using a...
Mathalicious
Pic Me!
Finally! Math and Instagram have come together to discuss the correlation between likes and followers. High schoolers can't help but want to discover what makes one account more popular than another by developing a line of best fit and...
National Security Agency
Equations and Expressions
Learners demonstrate their knowledge pictorially, concretely, and abstractly in this unit meant to last three hours over three days. Using hands-on activities, manipulatives, real-world applications, and problem...
Differentiation Central
Perimeter and Area
Leave no student behind with this differentiated geometry unit on perimeter and area. Over the course of five lessons, young mathematicians explore these foundational concepts through a series of self-selected hands-on activities and...
Las Cumbres Observatory
Plotting a Supernova Light curve
Supernovas burn for a short time but can give scientists extensive information about the universe. Learners analyze given data about the change in the light magnitude of a supernova. They look for patterns in the data and use them to...
Illustrative Mathematics
Riding by the Library
Draw a graph that shows the qualitative features of a function that has been described verbally. Make sure learners understand where time is zero and the distance is zero. It may take them some time to understand this concept, so working...
Curated OER
Lesson 3: Where Does Money Come From?
Students listen to story Hundred Penny Box by Sharon Bell Mathis, explore history of money, and examine how money is produced in the United States. They discuss why money is used for exchange, and describe how money has changed over time.
Mathalicious
On Your Mark
With many factors leading to a great athlete, does height make Usain Bolt unfairly fast? Middle schoolers conduct analysis to change the running distance of the Olympic races to be proportional to the height of the participants. They...
Curated OER
Carbon 14 Dating, Variation 2
Your archaeologists begin this task with a table of values to estimate the time passed based on the half-life of Carbon 14 remaining in a plant. They then move on to find when a specific amount of Carbon 14 is present in the same plant,...
The New York Times
Understanding the Mathematics of the Fiscal Cliff
What exactly is the fiscal cliff? What are the effects of changing income tax rates and payroll tax rates? Your learners will begin by reading news articles and examining graphs illustrating the "Bush tax cuts" of 2001 and 2003. They...
Curated OER
In the Billions and Exponential Modeling
Modeling population growth gives learners an opportunity to experiment with real data. Comparing the growth rates in this real-life task strengthens learners' understanding that exponential functions change by equal factors over equal...
EngageNY
Constant Rates Revisited
Find the faster rate. The resource tasks the class to compare proportional relationships represented in different ways. Pupils find the slope of the proportional relationships to determine the constant rates. They then analyze the...
University of Connecticut
Weather Vs. Whether
Monarch butterfly populations have decreased by 90 percent over the past 20 years due to misuse and ineffectiveness of some pesticides. Given the challenge to increase pesticide safety and effectiveness, the class, through discussion,...
Visa
Financial Forces: Understanding Taxes and Inflation
Take the opportunity to offer your young adults some important financial wisdom on the way taxes and inflation will affect their lives in the future. Through discussion and review of different real-world scenarios provided...
Science 4 Inquiry
The Ups and Downs of Populations
As the reality of population decline across many species becomes real, pupils learn about the variables related to changes in populations. They complete a simulation of population changes and graph the results, then discuss limiting...
Illustrative Mathematics
Baseball Cards
Here is a resource that demonstrates growth and the initial state of an equation. In this case, your class will be looking at baseball collections. How many baseball cards did the collector start out with, and how many were added or...
EngageNY
The Computation of the Slope of a Non-Vertical Line
Determine the slope when the unit rate is difficult to see. The 17th part of a 33-part series presents a situation that calls for a method to calculate the slope for any two points. It provides examples when the slope is hard to...