Boxplots are statistical representations for organizing and displaying data that are relatively easy to create with a five-number summary. However, boxplots are not as easy to understand, interpret, or connect with other statistical representations of the same data. We worked at two different schools with 259 middle school students who constructed and interpreted boxplots. We observed that even students who were able to create boxplots had difficulty interpreting data represented in a boxplot. After sharing specific difficulties that we observed students having, we discuss ways to help students to make sense of data presented in boxplots.
The suggestion to engage students in studying the effects on the graph of the quadratic function y = ax2 + bx + c that result from varying the parameters a, b, and c is certainly not a new idea. In this article, we first review a few of the specific suggestions that have occurred over the past fifty years. Then we propose an activity of our own that makes use of the new generation of handheld technologies.
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