Visualising Data

You probably own a graphing calculator that does calculations and draws mathematical graphs. It is easy to carry around and use, but you cannot copy the results onto paper. The graph at the right was drawn with a computer program, so the picture could easily be copied into this page. It shows that the area between the curve and the line is approximately 19.5 . (http://www.graphcalc.com)
Graphs and diagrams let us easily see relationships between data. This is much easier than looking at a bunch of numbers. This chart shows stock prices for IBM during last year. It is easy to see that the price dropped suddenly in April, but has generally increased since then, but dropped again last month. This is all much easier to see in a graph than in a long list of numbers. (http://www.prophet.net/ )
It is similarly difficult to see that average world-wide temperature has increased over the past 150 years by looking at numbers. This chart makes it easy to see the trend of increasing temperatures. (warming.xls)
When a rock falls, it will fall 5 meters in the first second, then 15 m in the next second, then 25 m in the third second, then 35 m, etc. We can write down numbers and add them up to figure out when the rock will hit the ground 1000 m below, but it is easier to understand what is happening when we look at a graph. Judging from the graph, it looks like the rock will hit the ground after about 14 seconds. (www.graphmatica.com)	Height in meters Time in Seconds

Assignment

You will make several charts and graphs. You must copy each graph and collect them all in a MS-Word document.
When you are finished with all the questions, print your document and turn it in to the teacher (on paper).

Get a copy of graphcalc either from http://www.graphcalc.com or by copying from \\timon\labs\lab329\math

Draw the curve (you need to type 6x - x^2). Measure the area under the curve,
that is between x=0 and x=6. Copy the graph into your MS-Word document
and write a brief explanation beneath the pictur.
Draw the line on the same graph. Then shade the area between the two graphs.
You will find that it is more than half the total area from #1.
Move the line up and down until you make the area between the curve and the line exactly half
of the total area (you can stop when you are within 0.01 of being perfect).

The stock graph was produced automatically by a web-site : http://www.prophet.net/
You can get a graph of prices for any stock you wish.

Go to the web-site and get a graph of prices for each of the following companies:
GM (General Motors) , MSFT (Microsoft) , GOOG (Google)
For each company, read the graph and decide whether the graph has generally
been going up or down or staying steady over the past year.
For the company that has been increasing the fastest over the past year,
print the graph and draw a straight line that approximately follows the graph.
Use the line you drew to make a prediction of the price one year from now.

The graph for Mean Global Temperature was made using Excel. You can download the spreadsheet file
by clicking here : warming.xls . The teacher will show you how to create the graph and draw a best-fit-line.

Create the graph, add the best-fit-line, and copy the graph into your document.
Use the equation for the best-fit-line (or use your brain) to answer the following questions:
(a) How much will the mean global temperature increase in the next 20 years?
(b) How much will the mean global temperature increase in the next 100 years?

The curve showing the rock falling was drawn using Graphmatica. You can get a copy of Graphmatica
from : www.graphmatica.com , or copy it from the Lab329 server (in the math directory).

Use graphmatica to draw a graph of the same best-fit-line from #6 above.
You might wish to read the notes here: Best Fit Line with Graphmatica
(a) Mark the point where the graph shows the temperature 20 years from now.
(b) Mark the point where the graph shows the temperature 100 years from now.
(c) Mark the point where the graph reaches 30 degrees. What year will this happen?