Activity:  Personal Motivation, Daily Achievement, and Milestone Performance as a Statistical Measure of Short and Long Term Predictions

Pre-Activity:  Homework on Predicting Performance Based on Four Weeks of Data Gathering on Student Performance

Do Now:  Write out everything that you can think of that you want in life, and how you will get it while having fun in the process.

Aim:  Manage Personal Energy to Obtain Optimal Outcomes

Major Assignment:  Use Scientific Tools of Prediction on a Current, Personal Example

Processes, Skills, Goals:  Time Management, Statistical Analysis, Predictive Models Compared to Reality 

Content:  Review of class performance on essays, tests, homework, notebooks, and labs.

Instructions:  Ask students to offer ways that they have found that worked to get themselves to perform at optimal levels.  Share stories on motivation, such as the one contained in the SpeedReader web site.  Draw on stories or quotes from popular celebrities, as well as accomplished scientists.  Examine statistics of class performance, including graphs of grades over time.  Ask the class to make predictions about the future performance of an anonymous student based upon past performance.  Extend examination of grades to measures of motivation.  Or the KSAs of faculty, administration, and available equipment.  Examine maps of education, income, and race to determine if these are appropriate predictors of student performance.  Explain that this is a local, personal example of how an outsider might take a scientific, statistical approach to examining an individual's performance, and then offer solutions to the "problem".  Introduce government policy and mapping as a science of statistics.  Show the relationship between hunger and student performance.  "Vitamins for Everyone!?".

Materials:  Slide show of motivational quotes and photos, as well as local maps of education, income and race.

Guiding Questions:  Do you like performing well?  Does everyone do everything equally well?  Do you like sharing what you know how to do well?  What do the graphs of student performance say about student performance?  Do they predict the future?  How well?  Can the future be changed?  How?  What does that say about other statistical analyses and predictions in science?  Are they infallible, or just probabilistic?

Homework:  Determine local high and low tides for the next two days, including elevations and their changes.