Teaching Data Literacy
- Lesson Plans
- Classroom Tools
- Resources
In today’s data-driven world, students need more than just reading and writing skills - they need data literacy. Whether analyzing graphs on climate change or interpreting charts in the news, understanding data is key to becoming an informed, empowered citizen. This page offers tools, lesson plans, and articles to help educators bring data literacy into the classroom in engaging, age-appropriate ways.
Spotlight Resource
Watch PopEd staff explain how to teach climate change data in the classroom.
People and Climate Change: The Data Is In
In this climate change and data analysis lesson, students engage with a variety of data formats—including graphs, written reports, and…
Go To ResourceTeachers’ Favorites: Top Data Literacy Activities
Access lesson plans and activities that teach students to analyze, question, and interpret real-world data.
Students conduct a census of their schoolmates’ households, graph their data, and then analyze the results to make a decision... Read more »
Students investigate three different data sets covering maternal mortality, and articulate the benefits and shortcomings of each group of data.... Read more »
Students use small manipulatives and a sampling method to estimate the population of flowers in a field. Students will be... Read more »
Students analyze data and images about three megacities, identifying challenges and benefits of growing urbanization, and then collaborate in small... Read more »
Students use beans to model population growth in several mystery countries while varying four key demographic factors. Students will be... Read more »
Through collaborative analysis of visual data on the Quick Trip to 8 Billion poster, students investigate how demographics and resource... Read more »
Explore More Ideas on Teaching Data Literacy
Dive into why data literacy matters today and in the future.
When we scroll through social media or read the news, we aren’t just looking at text. We are constantly faced... Read more »
As the internet transforms our lives and the way we interact with media, those who are unable to access technology... Read more »
Evidence is the linchpin for effective argumentation. Without quality evidence, an argument falls apart. This is especially true for the... Read more »