Scatterplots and Correlations with Food Access
Provided by: Skew the Script|Published on: May 28, 2025|Last updated: September 26, 2026
Grades: 11, 12, AP
Type: Lesson Plans
Subjects: Civics, Mathematics
Authors: Skew the Script
This resource has been reviewed by SubjectToClimate's climate scientists and verified for scientific accuracy and up-to-date information. Learn about our review process →
This resource has been reviewed by SubjectToClimate's climate scientists and verified for scientific accuracy and up-to-date information. Learn about our review process →
Synopsis
- In this lesson from Skew the Script, students will use a real-life data set depicting the relationship between income and organic food access in San Antonio, Texas, to understand scatterplots.
- Through a video lesson, interactive practice problems, presentation slides, guided notes, and more, students will understand explanatory and response variables, positive and negative correlations, how to describe scatterplots, the correlation coefficient, and correlation vs. causation.
Teaching Materials
Positives
- This lesson includes many opportunities for students to practice, and the helpful post-video form makes it easy for teachers to know which students may need additional assistance.
- The teacher in this video is using a student-provided research question for this lesson, which shows students how important their voices are and that they should continue to ask and explore their questions.
Prerequisites
- Students are expected to know the meaning behind the guidelines "Title. Tick, tick. Label, label, label." Teachers should go over this with them ahead of time.
- Teachers will need to create a free account and enter some information to access the materials. Additionally, teachers will need to create a Desmos account to assign the activity and see student responses online.
Differentiation & Implementation
- Students can bring this topic into a broader conversation about redlining, sacrifice zones, food deserts, and environmental justice.
- After discussing this topic, students can take a look at ways some people are working to get healthy foods to low-income areas. This video about an urban farm and this video addressing food deserts in the Bronx are two great examples of these actions.
- To talk more about unequal access to healthy foods, students can check out this video about our food system.
This lesson explains scatter plots, correlation, and causation by looking at access to organic foods for people of different incomes as well as ice cream sales compared to the number of drownings. While climate change is not explicitly discussed, correlation and causation are fundamental concepts needed to understand climate change and how increased CO2 causes warmer temperatures, which cause various climate impacts. Additionally, equality and climate justice can be tied into the lesson. The information presented is accurate, and this resource is recommended for teaching.
Teaching Tips
Standards
Resource Type and Format
Scientist Reviewed
This resource has been reviewed by SubjectToClimate's climate scientists and verified for scientific accuracy and up-to-date information. Our review process ensures that every resource in our library reflects the current state of climate science.
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