Microsoft Training for Educators

Day of Data: Rockets - a NASA and Microsoft Hacking STEM collaboration

Course Description

We’re excited to collaborate with NASA to bring you the Day of Data: Rockets program, where your students explore how data powers our astronauts, our space missions, and our world. Celebrate data with on-demand conversations with astronauts, lesson plans, and virtual experiences. Prepare your students for the future by tapping into their creativity and curiosity with NASA and Microsoft Hacking STEM. Take them on a journey to outer space!

The Artemis rocket is about to launch! Enjoy some updates to the Day of Data: Rockets curriculum incorporating Artemis.

Immerse your students in a fun and interactive data science project as you celebrate your own Day of Data. Choose from two 50-minute activities that are suitable for remote learning. Two levels are offered, depending on your students’ comfort with data, to meet them where they are and get them excited! Your students can explore data in a self-paced Excel workbook and participate in supplemental activities like sending a postcard into space. Don’t forget to check out the video overview of each workbook to get started!

About this Course

Course Outline

Stage 1 – Introduction to Data

Launch your students on their data exploration journey with a self-paced, online Excel activity that introduces beginning concepts for understanding and using data.

Age: 8-12 years old

Length: 50 minutes

Lesson highlights:

Introduction to data and types of data
Understand how data can be organized and sorted with tables
Experience how data can be visualized with a chart to gain valuable insights

Learning standards:

NGSS 5-PS1-2. Measure and graph quantities such as weight to address scientific and engineering questions and problems.
CCSS.Math.Content.3.MD.B.3. Draw a scaled picture graph and a scaled bar graph to represent a data set with several categories. Solve one- and two-step “how many more” and “how many less” problems using information presented in scaled bar graphs.
ISTE 5b. Students collect data or identify relevant data sets, use digital tools to analyze them, and represent data in various ways to facilitate problem-solving and decision-making.

Stage 2 – Introduction to data visualization

Launch your students on their data visualization journey with a self-paced, online Excel activity that introduces them to visualizing data using charts.

Age: 10-15 years old

Length: 50 minutes

Lesson highlights:

Introduction to common chart types and their purpose
Experience how simple charts can be used to gain insights when you have two data categories
Explore how more complex charts can be used to interpret data when you have three data categories

Learning standards:

NGSS MS-ESS1-3. Analyze and interpret data to determine similarities and differences in findings.
CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.7.RP.A.2. Recognize and represent proportional relationships between quantities.
ISTE 5b. Students collect data or identify relevant data sets, use digital tools to analyze them, and represent data in various ways to facilitate problem-solving and decision-making.

Lesson plan principles

The lesson plans are built using these principles:

- Relevance. Data Science is one of the fastest growing professions (Bureau of Labor Statistics), every industry needs data analytics – including business in all sectors, healthcare, education, and every form of social programming. Inspiring the advance of NextGen’s data analytics skills is to stimulate reasoning, discourse, and decision-making, ultimately creating a smarter world for us all.
- Equity for All. Multimodal, dynamic, scaffolded instructions support learners at multiple readiness levels and from diverse backgrounds.
- Accessibility. Designed to open doors to student participation in the data science revolution, these lessons are supported on any internet-enabled device. Use a larger screen (laptop or desktop) for the best experience.
- Aligned to Standards. All activities are aligned to key Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), Common Core State Standards for Mathematics, and International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) standards.