Working With Graphs - Minnesota Demographics

Purpose:   to give learners practice working with a graph, a tool commonly used to show trends, or ups and downs, over a period of time in a visual way

Prep time:  15 minutes

Materials:  copies of the handout, pens or pencils

Prep:  Before students are presented with a graph, plan to ask a series of questions that will create context for the activity.  Think about vocabulary you’ll need to pre-teach as well. 

Procedure:

1) Find out what students already know about people living in Minnesota and in their countries of origin.  What is a minority group?  What are some examples?  What does “diversity” mean?  Is the classroom diverse?  Is Minnesota as diverse as other states?

2) At this point, present the graph to the class, along with questions that will encourage interpretation:

• What do the numbers, going from left to right along the bottom of the graph, represent?
• What do the numbers going up the left side represent?
• What does it mean when the first bar on the graph is higher than the other bars?
• Look at the title of the graph.  What does it mean?
• Which group is larger than the others?  Which group is smaller than the others?

3) Once there is a general understanding of the graph, students can be given a structured exercise: a modified cloze passage based on the graph and designed to practice verb tenses, the comparative, or the statistics provided on the graph.  Whatever the focus, leaving the choice of verb, adjective, or number up to the learners makes the exercise more demanding.  For less advanced students, list possible answers on the board and reduce the number of blanks, or provide a word bank on the worksheet.

4) Students can do this exercise individually and then compare their answers working in pairs or small groups.

5) Reading the paragraph aloud is good practice!