Data Science Worksheet for 12-Year-Olds | Middle School Intro to Data

Instructions

Data science is like being a detective! Instead of looking for clues at a crime scene, a data scientist looks for clues and patterns in information (called data) to solve problems and answer important questions. Let's put on our detective hats and explore the world of data!

Part 1: The Data Science Process

Being a data detective involves a few key steps. Match each step of the data science process on the left with its correct description on the right. Draw a line connecting them.

Part 2: You're the Data Detective!

For each scenario below, think like a data scientist. What question are you trying to answer, and what data would you need to collect?

Scenario A: Your school cafeteria wants to add a new item to the lunch menu. They want to pick something that most students will actually buy and eat.

1. The Question to Ask:
   


2. Data to Collect:
   

Scenario B: Your friend has a popular video game channel. They want to post their next video at the time when the most people are likely to watch it.

1. The Question to Ask:
   


2. Data to Collect:
   

Part 3: Find the Outlier

An outlier is a piece of data that is very different from the rest of the group. It's the number that just doesn't seem to fit in. Can you spot the outlier in each data set below? Circle it.

1. Test Scores (out of 100):

85, 92, 88, 21, 95, 89

2. Ages of students in a 7th-grade class:

12, 13, 12, 12, 34, 13, 12

3. Time spent on homework each night (in minutes):

45, 60, 55, 50, 5, 65

Part 4: Show, Don't Just Tell!

A huge part of data science is showing your results in a way that's easy to understand. This is called data visualization.

Imagine you surveyed your class to find their favorite type of movie (Comedy, Action, Sci-Fi, or Horror). What are the BEST ways to show these results so everyone can quickly see which genre is the most popular? Circle all the good choices.

• A) A long paragraph describing how many students chose each genre, one by one.
• B) A pie chart where each slice represents a movie genre.
• C) A bar chart comparing the number of votes for each genre.
• D) A list showing every single student's individual answer.

Answer Key

Part 1: The Data Science Process

• 1. Ask a Question → C. Decide what problem you want to solve or what you are curious about.
• 2. Collect Data → E. Gather the information you need from surveys, experiments, or websites.
• 3. Clean Data → B. Fix mistakes, remove messy or incomplete information, and get everything organized.
• 4. Analyze Data → A. Look for patterns, connections, and interesting stories hidden in the information.
• 5. Share Findings → D. Tell others what you discovered using charts, graphs, and stories so they can understand it.

Part 2: You're the Data Detective!

(Answers may vary slightly but should be similar to these.)

Scenario A:

1. The Question to Ask: What new food item would be most popular with students?
2. Data to Collect: Survey students about what foods they would like to see on the menu.

Scenario B:

1. The Question to Ask: What day and time do my videos get the most views?
2. Data to Collect: The viewing history/analytics from past videos (e.g., from the channel's dashboard).

Part 3: Find the Outlier

1. The outlier is 21. (All other scores are high.)
2. The outlier is 34. (All other students are 12 or 13.)
3. The outlier is 5. (All other times are much longer.)

Part 4: Show, Don't Just Tell!

The best choices are B and C.

• B) A pie chart is great for showing parts of a whole (what percentage of the class likes each genre).
• C) A bar chart is excellent for comparing the total counts for different categories.
• (A and D are not good visual tools; they are just lists of information that are hard to understand quickly.)