Lesson 12

Arrange students in groups of 3--4. Provide each group with a set of newspaper clippings involving percentage increase and decrease. 

Tell students to take turns sorting the clippings into the piles representing percentage increase and percentage decrease and explaining the decision. If there is a disagreement, partners should discuss their ideas to try to agree about the correct sorting of the item. If an agreement cannot be made, the clipping can be put to the side to be discussed after the activity.

The purpose of the discussion is to discuss any issues students may have had determining the sorting as well as to discuss any interesting contexts from the clippings.

Ask students, "Were there any clippings that were not easy to sort? What made it difficult?" Work with the class to try to determine the correct sorting, if possible. Ask each group to read the important parts of their most interesting newspaper clipping and explain their reasoning behind sorting it where they did.

In this activity, students use the examples of percentage increase and decrease that they sorted in the previous activity to pose questions that arise from the different situations. They ask and answer questions based on the information given and present this information graphically. In the next activity they will make a poster using one of their news items. Then students will go on a gallery walk and use sticky notes to ask questions about the information presented on each poster.

Keep students in groups of 3–4. Display the following statement for all to see:

"Global human population growth amounts to around 75 million annually, or 1.1% per year." 

Ask students what questions they could answer with this information. Sample responses:

• What were possible populations in the two years used to compute the annual increase?
• By how many people will the population grow next year?

Tell students they will use the clippings from the warm-up to write similar questions for different situations.

In this activity, students work in groups and make a poster in their groups using one of their news items. Next, students go on a gallery walk and use sticky notes to ask questions about the information presented on each poster. They practice critiquing the reasoning of others as they study information they have not themselves worked on. They then go back and study the feedback they received from their classmates and revise their own work.

Keep students in the same groups of 3–4. Give students supplies to make posters. Tell them that they will choose one of their news clippings and make a visual display for the information they worked on in the previous activity. The posters should include all necessary information so that somebody who has not extensively worked with the same information should be able to understand the work.

Allow students 10 minutes to work on creating their display. Review group work as they finish.

After all groups have finished, display each group's work around the room for students to do a gallery walk. Tell students that they should leave feedback for each display on a sticky note attached to each group's work. Feedback can include questions about the display or information as well as compliments or critiques. Comments and questions should be constructive with the goal to help the groups who made the poster improve their work.

Tell each group which poster to start with and in which direction they should move.

As groups finish viewing the displays, allow them time to view the feedback left on their own display and, if necessary, time to improve their display based on the feedback.