What Colors Mean in Different Cultures

Click the image below to make the graphic large. From there, consider cultures and colors. What surprises do you find?

Source: Visual.ly

How Different Groups Spend Their Day?

People spend their time working, watching TV and movies, sleeping, and household activities. Unemployed people do lots of household activities, watch tons of TV and movies,and spend lots of their time sleeping. 15-24 year olds spend 25% of their time studying, another 25% of working, and spend half of their time sleeping. 25-64 year olds work,eat and drink,and they also watch TV and movies. People ages 65 and over spend most of their time watching TV and movies, doing household activities, and sleeping.

The image show is an "infographic," or slang for "informational graphic." An inforgraphic can be any map, chart, or diagram used to show an event, object or place. This infographic from The New York Times is made with a computer program called Flash. Flash is program for creating interactive features for websites. You can click on it and different thing will happen.

By Samantha Z. and Rachel N.

Photo credit: The New York Times

Infographic: How Do People Spend Their Days

How do Americans spend their time? This infographic shows you.

• The word infographic is slang for "informational graphic"; any map, chart, or diagram used to analyze an event, object or place.

• This infographic is made with a computer program called Flash. Flash is program for creating interactive features for websites.

Student Assignment:
Samantha, Rachel
Roll over and click onto this graphic. Spend several minutes clicking around and reading the information that pops up. Take notes as you do this.

Write a brief story -- five sentences -- about this infographic. What do you find most surprising and interesting about how people are spending their time?

Link to the website of The New York Times and include a screen grab or image of the infographic. Ms. Moorhead can show you how to do make a screen grap.

Remember to include the basics -- also known as the five W's -- of a news story:

• Who
• What
• When
• Where
• Why

Soda? Pop? Or Coke? It Depends Where You Live

Student: Faryn

Sugary, carbonated drinks have been the subject of some controversy lately, but there’s one soft-drink dispute that’s not new at all—what do you call them?

Check out Generic Names for Soft Drinks for an intricate map of America’s answers. Designed by Matthew Campbell, a cartography student at East Central University, and based on hundreds of thousands of responses collected at popvssoda.com, the map is a testament to the Internet’s ability to easily gather data over wide areas. It’s amazing how much information is packed into this chart—it’s clickable, color-coded and divided into individual counties, providing a high-resolution picture of a strangely potent cultural indicator. Surprisingly, the results seem to follow rough political boundaries—residents of mostly coastal, liberal areas like New England and California prefer “soda,” while the Deep South likes “coke” and the Midwest chooses “pop.” Apparently, there’s more to these names than meets the ear. (Source: Very Short List)

Write a news story about this map. You can use some of the information above for ideas, but the words must be your own. Remember to include the five W's of a good news story: who, what, when, where, and why? Also, include links, sources, labels, and at least one infographic.

Also, answer the following questions:

• What are infographics? Why are they important to include in our news stories and blog posts?
• What is cartography?
• If you finish early, work with Camryn to create a poll for students that asks how do they refer to soda/pop/coke.