It can be done cross-curricular, with any topic, and easily incorporated during instruction.
Here are just a few examples of graphing in my own classroom.
My students made apple sauce. We sliced apples, chopped them, added brown sugar, spices and cooked on a hot plate.
Before cooking the apple sauce, we tasted red, yellow and green apples. This was a great reason for graphing!
Students wrote their names on sticky notes and placed them next to their favorite type of apple. Simple and fun. We counted, talked about and compared the numbers, used"greater than" and "less than" and took turns explaining why we liked a certain type of apple better than the others.
We graphed how many boys and girls we have in class. I used clipart and made boy/girl picture cards which students colored before adding them to the graph.
First, I asked all students what type of pets they have. Believe it or not, this year I have a student with an alligator for a pet. Family confirmed, no lies here!
Anyway, I created pet categories and students wrote their name on a sticky note and placed it under the right pet category.
We used a Venn Diagram to graph siblings: brother/sister/both/none.
We measured our height using yarn and then graphed it. It was fun to see the height difference. I also took my students' pics and attached them to the yarn thus giving kids the chance to easily see how tall each friend is.
"Graphing Activities: Get To Know Me…" focused on graphing! It is cross-curricular and gives students the opportunity to learn how to graph, get to know one another, practice writing and reading, and have FUN!
