Data Nuggets are free activities that bring real scientific data into the classroom, guiding students through the entire process of science while building their quantitative abilities. Co-designed by Michigan State University scientists and teachers, Data Nuggets feature a scientist role model and the story of what inspired their research.
In a Data Nugget activity, students are guided through the entire process of science, including identifying hypotheses and predictions, visualizing and interpreting data, supporting claims using data as evidence, and asking their own questions for future research.
Data Nugget activities are ranked from 1 to 4 according to the reading, vocabulary, and content level of the background information provided to students. Each Data Nugget comes with three versions of the student activity (A–C) and a Teacher Guide.
The Teacher Guides provide example student responses, links to resources, and additional information about the research and scientist. Following the same structure as the student versions, the guides are designed to enrich classroom discussions by including suggested stopping points for class discussion and clarifications.
There are three types of stopping points:
Teacher Notes: additional background information for teachers, as well as suggestions for discussion topics. For example, a Teacher Note may share information provided by the scientist, detailing what the scientist’s next research steps were after collecting the data presented in the activity.
Checks for Understanding: stopping points for teachers to assess student understanding after students finish reading the Background Information sections or have just started to view and work with the data.
Meta Moments: stopping points for students to think about their own thinking. Stepping back from the research, students can discuss the decisions they are making as they work through the Data Nugget, such as the way they chose to visualize their data to ease interpretation and support their claims.
A list of additional resources related to each Data Nugget appears at the end of each Teacher Guide. These resources may include primary literature, videos that the scientist has made about their research, blog posts or other popular articles about the research included in the Data Nugget, or additional photos and images.
Because of their simplicity and flexibility, Data Nuggets can be used throughout the school year and across K–16, as students grow in their quantitative abilities and gain confidence. Data Nuggets have the potential to improve the understanding of science while engaging and motivating the next generation of scientists.