Lesson 2: Data Visualization
September 8, 2025
Review:
- Attendance
- Course Intro
- Labor Day
- DataCamp
Presentation:
- Histograms
- Visualizing Data Distributions with Histograms
- Demonstrate Histogram construction in Sheets
- Scatterplots
- Visualizing Bivariate Relationships with Scatterplots
- Demonstrate Scatterplot construction in Sheets
- Pivot Tables
- Demonstrate Pivot Tables using US County Dataset in Sheets
Activity:
- Download and Pivot
- Download US County Dataset
- Create a Pivot Table
- 49 rows and 4 columns
- Each row corresponds to 48 States and Washington DC (Alaska and Hawaii are excluded)
- Each column corresponds to four variables: Population, GDP, Median HH Income, and Poverty %
- Calculate the aggregate “Sum” for Population and GDP by State
- Calculate the aggregate “Average” for Median HH Income and Poverty % by State
- Visualize State Data
- Create graphs (use Insert > Chart)
- Use the resulting State aggregation (from the Pivot table)
- Make four (4) histograms
- (1) Population
- (2) GDP
- (3) Median HH Income
- (4) Poverty %
- Make four (4) scatter plots:
- (1) Population (x) vs GDP (y)
- (2) GDP (x) vs Poverty % (y)
- (3) GDP (x) vs Median HH Income (y)
- (4) Median HH Income (x) vs Poverty % (y)
- All graphs must have axis labels
- All scatter plots must include a “Trendline” along with labels for the “Equation” and “R^2 value”
- Create graphs (use Insert > Chart)
Assignment:
- Watch this Module Introduction Video first!
- Please note: Changes since the video was recorded
- You’ll be working with Colorado’s Economic Regions instead of Congressional Districts.
- This should make life easier for you because the Congressional Districts are trickier.
- I haven’t changed the video so I still refer to Congressional Districts.
- Whenever you hear Congressional Districts think Economic Regions instead.
- Step 1
- Video 2.1: Data Assembly
- Compile a Colorado County Data Set
- Download population data for all US counties
- Download County GDP from the Bureau of Economic Analysis
- Look up Economic Regions and assign each Colorado County to one of 14 regions
- Video 2.1: Data Assembly
- Step 2
- Video 2.2: Pivot Tables
- If you haven’t already, complete Pivot Tables in Spreadsheets
- Use a Pivot Table to aggregate GDP and Population by Economic Region
- Video 2.3: Visualizing frequency distributions
- Make two histograms
- Experiment with different bucket sizes
- Label axes
- Video 2.4: Visualizing bivariate relationships
- Make one scatterplot
- Add a trend line
- Add labels to show linear equation and R^2 value on the chart
- Video 2.2: Pivot Tables
