Copyright 2001 © Laraine Flemming.
1. Try taking a poll of the class and ask your students how many look at, let alone read, the charts, tables, and graphs in their textbooks. If they are like the students of my experience, it will quickly become apparent that they pay no attention to these three sources of information. Thus, the first thing to do when teaching this chapter is convince students that charts, tables, and graphs shouldn't be ignored for the following reasons:
2. Since I had to train myself to read visual aids, I feel justified in telling students that their ability to interpret them will improve over time. It just takes practice. No one knows that better than I, who used to approach a line graph with fear and trembling.
3. It helps to have students make their own visual aids. They can, for example, use a pie chart to track how they spend their time in the span of a day. You can also give them an exercise that supplies the raw data and tell them to plot the graph that organizes that data.
4. Show students how readings that describe a system of classification can be turned into tables. They can also use flow charts to take notes on readings that track a process. These are useful exercises because they give students additional note-taking methods that draw attention to underlying patterns in readings.
Last change made to this page: August 11, 2004