a. How would you interpret the graph in the picture?

b. How would you respond to student A?

c. How would you extend this discussion to the whole class?

d. What could be the aims of showing real-life examples to students?

e. The teacher uses an excerpt from the news to bring attention on how graphs might be (mis)used. How would you use a similar artifact in your teaching?

Follow-up:

What resources and support do you think teachers would need to bring examples of real-life data in lessons? Where would you recommend looking for resources and support?

1. Here is a sentence that sounds very much like ones that we have been hearing in the news in the last twenty months

or so: "About 1% of infected people will need hospitalisation and the growth of infections is exponential". How do you

explain this sentence to someone who does not know what "percentage" and "exponential growth" mean?

2. How would you respond to Anna?

3. How would you respond to Barack?

4. How would you respond to Clive?

5. How would you respond to the whole class – also in the light of Neil’s initial comment – and conclude the lesson?

1.                    What mathematical objects and routines do you see in the sources above?

2.                    How would you use those sources in mathematics lessons?

3.                    Consider the following statement:

Researchers do not agree whether fitting a quadratic curve is the right approach for the data set and future predictions. Sea-level data is naturally noisy, caused by ocean currents, seasonal effects and natural variability. Fitting a smooth curve, be that quadratic or linear, to noisy data means the shape of the fitted curve can change quite a lot depending on the years chosen.

What activity can the debate that underpins this statement trigger in the mathematics classroom?