The world we live in is increasingly data-driven. Equipping students with the skills needed to thrive in this world requires educational tools that engage students in using data to construct knowledge and solve problems. EDC|CCT, in partnership with Concord Consortium, will design, develop, and test six supplemental curriculum units that build high school students’ skills in using data to investigate and explain significant problems in biology and earth science. The units will be delivered via a highly scaffolded online instructional platform—EDC|CCT’s Zoom In— and will integrate the powerful data analysis software created by Concord Consortium’s Common Online Data Analysis Platform (CODAP).

The project’s modules and digital tools will make it easier for high school teachers to teach important data skills in the context of their regular science instruction, and for students to develop these skills while pursuing meaningful science inquiries. In each module, students will interact with a rich data set as they examine a particular scientific phenomenon—for example, analyzing finch body measurements to document evolution in action—and learn and use specific data literacy skills. The project builds on our successful work using the Zoom In platform to foster evidence-based inquiry and explanation in social studies, adapting this approach to support data-focused inquiries in biology and earth science at the high-school level.

This project is funded by the NSF DRK–12 program, which seeks to significantly enhance the learning and teaching of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics by preK–12 students and teachers through research and development of innovative resources, models, and tools.