General Education Activity | STEM Career Connection: Sports Statistician
Standards: 2007 MN Math 5.2.1.1, 2019 MN Science 3.2.1.1
How do organizations build successful teams? This activity lets students gather and analyze data to build a Teacher Dream Team.
Materials:
Predict:
How do you think football teams choose their players? This introduction to the player combine features videos and Minnesota Vikings stats.
Plan: Teacher Dream Team
Ask students to identify what qualities make a good teacher.
How could we measure those qualities?
How could we make a "Dream Team" of teachers?
Play: Teacher Combine
Brainstorm with students about the activities teachers need to do quickly.
Examples: How many pencils can your teacher sharpen in 30 seconds? How fast can your teacher hand out papers?
Collect or create your own data from other teachers to see statistics.
Have students create visual representations of the data.
Create a bar chart of the number of pencils each teacher can sharpen in 30 seconds.
Have students go around the room, gallery walk-style, comparing the different results and creating their “ideal” teacher team considering each teacher’s specialties.
Present students with the “Teacher Challenges.” Did students make a team of teachers that can meet the needs of the challenge?
Example: Your team needs to be able to sharpen at least 15 pencils and hand out 40 papers in 30 seconds.
Ponder:
These are silly challenges that don't really tell you if someone would be a good teacher. What are some things you can't measure that good teachers need? What are some things you can't measure that good players need?
Why might collecting data help you make good choices?
Does data always show the full picture? What things might not be able to be measured with data that might go into making a good decision?
SEL Connection: Why is having all available information important? Example: both perspectives during a conflict.
Extension:
Brainstorm school choices that could be helped with data collection. Make a list of the possible data points and choose one choice to follow through with as a class. (Example: Best school lunch. Questions: How many kids choose lunch on those days? What’s the average time for a student to finish lunch? How much of the lunch gets thrown away?)
SEL Connection: Read How to Lose All Your Friends by Nancy Carlson. What combine activities could you create to identify a good friend?