Information Presentation and Consumption in the Quantitative Reasoning Pathway

Responsible citizenship in our modern society is driven by quantitative literacy skills. If a society does not ensure that all are able to think critically when consuming and presenting mathematical ideas, then some will be limited in their social, financial, and employment opportunities. Students with an understanding of various modeling techniques and ways in which information is presented (and mis-presented) are better equipped to be contributing members of society. Being critical consumers of information supports people in analyzing problems and making decisions. Students who are critical consumers of information, and good presenters of information, have healthy skepticism and know when to ask for more information.

Faculty at the MIP Quantitative Reasoning Initiation Workshop in May, 2021 recommended that instructional resources developed by CoRDs and ARCs addressing Information Presentation and Consumption for success in the Oklahoma Quantitative Reasoning Pathway should support students in:

1. Analyzing and communicating mathematical ideas using appropriate representations. By “appropriate,” we mean both mathematically appropriate and appropriate for the audience.

2. Presenting data so that general trends, patterns, and hidden features (e.g., normalization, disaggregation) are apparent

3. Attending to ethical considerations in presentation and consumption of information (e.g., not misleading intentionally, identifying misleading information in a given representation, questioning sources)

4. Connecting mathematical ideas to real world situations and communicating mathematical ideas across a variety of media (e.g., spoken, written, gestured and digital presentations)

5. Creating charts, graphs, tables, text, equations, Venn diagrams, trees, decision matrices, etc. as appropriate; using data sets, or other information that is supplied, to create a representation of data, as well as justifying the use of the representation for the audience and context

6. Recognizing the role the ordering, area, shape, and space play in a variety of mathematical presentations (e.g., Cartesian graphs, Venn Diagrams, stacked bar graphs, pie charts, tree diagrams, decision matrices, box-and-whisker plots, polar graphs, radar graphs, Gantt charts)

7. Identifying patterns, trends and relationships in data, including covariational relationships

8. Determining the use and misuse of statistics; understand the difference between correlation and causation

9. Building the capacity to read and summarize charts, graphs, tables, and equations and communicate that understanding in multiple ways both spoken and written

10. Making and justifying inferences and predictions based on mathematical information represented in a variety of forms

11. Using digital tools and platforms (e.g., spreadsheets, videos, chart makers) to support the above goals

Addressing Components of Inquiry

Participants of the MIP Workshop on Quantitative Reasoning suggested the following ways resources about Information Presentation and Consumption could address the three MIP components of mathematical inquiry:

Active Learning: There is generally not a “one size fits all” procedure that captures the “best” way to present information, nor is their necessarily a single lens through which information might be interpreted. Presenting and interpreting information provides many opportunities for students to devise their own methods of presenting and interpreting, which can serve as an effective means by which to encourage them to select, perform, and evaluate these methods.

Meaningful Applications: Information presentation and consumption is inherently not specific to one context or topic. It is therefore a rich topic through which to emphasize meaningful applications, a key aspect of which is generalization across contexts and topics. Designing experiences for students in which a few key principles of information presentation and consumption emerge as critical across very different contexts could be a productive way to support students in developing these competencies.

Academic Success Skills: Information can be productively presented and interpreted in many different ways, and thus offers an opportunity to promote mathematical creativity and support students’ in developing their mathematical confidence in ways not afforded by more “conventional” topics. Identifying and communicating patterns in data (and their associated implications) that are perhaps not initially obvious might help students develop a sense of ownership of the content (effecting a positive change on their own identities as mathematics learners).

References

Eric Gaze’s blog https://thinkingquantitatively.wordpress.com/