Lesson Plan Title : Graphing Mexican Immigration

Age Range: Grade 9 through grade 12 (High School)

Overview and Purpose: This math lesson encourages students to practice their graphing skills as they research the trend in Mexican immigrants over the past 100 years. Students are asked to interpret the data they gather and create a graph showing the information.

Objective: The student will be able to create a chart showing the increase or decrease in Mexican immigrants over the last 100 years.

Resources:

Internet access for each student

Drawing paper

Pencils

Activities:

Have students research the trend in immigrants from Mexico to the United States over the last 100 years. They should create a graph that shows the information. The graph can be broken down by decades and should have information from at least two sources. Have students write a one or two paragraph summary of their findings.. Come back together as a class and compare information after everyone has finished.

Wrap Up:

Encourage students to create unique and colorful graphs, they should be more than just black lines plotted on a graph. More advanced students could compare the number of immigrants from Mexico with the number of immigrants from other countries. They could research and write about whether the numbers are proportionate to each other and why or why not.