2. Dealing with scientific data can be challenging and intimidating to the inexperienced.

3.  Technology can bring unprecedented amounts of information directly to students and teachers in the classroom  Real world data adds meaning to in class activities  Few materials and resources are needed  Data and graph interpretation are required (TEKS) and needed (TAKS) skills.  Helps students develop critical thinking skills

4.  Students become lost in the information they see, failing to learn domain concepts or “discovering” false ones.  Students use only a small, pre-determined subset of the available data, and so do not develop skills and habits for making sense of complexity.  Students have difficulty relating data to real world situations.

6. Need for structure Opportunities for freer exploration

7. Pre-design small data set and expand with models and images to provide insight into what data represent Pre-design large data set to develop expertise with specific case studies Query much larger data set and allow students to generate questions about the data

8.  Graphing  Interpreting data and graphs  Drawing conclusions  Supporting conclusions with evidence  Identifying relationships  Discovering patterns  Making predictions  Modeling data

9. Design an inquiry activity using data sets from the IRC or data sets of your choosing. Be sure the lesson has practical value within your scope and sequence.