Hello! Just wondering, will we be given a sheet of paper for our rough-work during the Math section of the Digital SAT? Or will there be a digital pen on the screen (Like in the exercises on khan academy)?

Yes, Sheet of paper will be used.

How many lessons do u all do per day?

i do 3! sometimes 2 if the topic tough. just practise a lot, understand concepts, then it wont be intimidating. good luck!

will you be able to use your own calculator on test day or must it be the one provided on bluebook?

You can use any of the two. Better use the one you are familiar with. If bringing you own, read the guidelines for the calculator that are allowed on collegeboard's website.

Is it enough to just prepare until medium level?

I think its best to practice until medium level only if you're stressed and can't keep up with the topic at that time. If that's the case, you can practice until medium level and then come back to it in a few days, it'd be much easier after your brain has gotten a bit used to it. However, don't leave it at medium level and always try to come back and attain Proficiency.

my aim is 1500+, do I need any material outside Khan Academy?

You will. I've noticed that the practice questions here are not as difficult as they are on other SAT practice sites

Main content

Course: Digital SAT Math > Unit 3

Lesson 5: Data representations: foundations

Data representations | Lesson

Google Classroom

A guide to data representations on the digital SAT

What are data representations problems?

Data representations problems ask us to interpret data representations or create data representations based on given information.

Aside from tables, the two most common data representation types on the SAT are bar graphs and line graphs.

In this lesson, we'll learn to:

Read types of graphs that commonly appear on the SAT
Create line graphs based on verbal descriptions

You can learn anything. Let's do this!

How do I read bar graphs, dot plots, and histograms?

Note: Bar graphs appear more frequently than dot plots and histograms do on the SAT.

Reading bar graphs

Khan Academy video wrapper

Reading bar graphsSee video transcript

What are bar graphs, dot plots, and histograms?

Bar graphs

On a bar graph, the sizes of the bars are related to the size of the quantities: the larger a quantity is, the taller or longer the bar representing it is.

The bar graph above shows us the grams of sugar per

100

grams of cereal for four cereal brands.

Since cereals brands C and D have taller bars than cereal brands A and B, we can immediately tell that cereal brands C and D have more sugar per $100$ ‍ grams of cereal than cereal brands A and B.
Cereal brands A and B have close to $10$ ‍ grams of sugar per $100$ ‍ grams of cereal, while cereal brands C and D have over $30$ ‍ grams of sugar per $100$ ‍ grams of cereal.
This means cereal brands C and D have over triple the amount of sugar per $100$ ‍ grams of cereal than cereal brands A and B!

The bar graphs above shows the number of students taking each of the four foreign languages offered at a high school. This type of bar graph is called a frequency bar graph because it shows the frequency with which each language is taken.

We can interpret the data as " $250$ ‍ students take Spanish", "approximately $60$ ‍ students take French", etc.
Based on the relative size of the bars, we can tell that Spanish is the most frequently taken foreign language and Latin is the least frequently taken foreign language.

Dot plots

Dot plots use dots to represent the frequency with which particular values occur. Dot plots are usually used for low, easily countable frequencies because it's impractical to draw or count many dots.

In the dot plot above, each dot represents the typical travel time to school for one student. Using the dot plot, we can tell that:

$3$ ‍ students take $5$ ‍ minutes to travel to school, $4$ ‍ students take $10$ ‍ minutes to travel to school, etc.
The most common travel time is $10$ ‍ minutes.
The travel times range from $5$ ‍ to $35$ ‍ minutes.

Histograms

Histograms use bars to represent the frequency at which a range of values occurs. Histograms are useful because it's often impractical to list every possible value independently.

The histogram above represents the number of available apartments for several area ranges. From the histogram, we can tell that:

$6$ ‍ available apartments have areas between $30$ ‍ and $40$ ‍ square meters, $4$ ‍ have areas between $40$ ‍ and $50$ ‍ square meters, etc.
There aren't many larger apartments available.

While the histogram tells us the number of apartments within each range of areas, it does not give us any information on the specific sizes of the apartments. For example, we know there's

1

apartment between

90

and

100

square meters, but we don't know its exact area: it could measure anywhere between

90

and

100

square meters!

Try it!

Try: interpret a bar graph

The bar graph above shows the number of sunny days in

2019

for four towns.

How many sunny days did Duskville have in

2019

Arrange the four towns in order from most number of sunny days to least number of sunny days in

2019

How do I read line graphs?

Reading line graphs

Khan Academy video wrapper

Reading line graphsSee video transcript

What are line graphs?

Line graphs usually show how quantities change over time.

The SAT will most often ask us to do the following:

Identify values on the graph and use them in calculations
Determine whether the graph is increasing or decreasing. We may be asked about a specific interval or the whole graph.
Determine when the rate of change is the highest/lowest. Higher rates of change correspond to steeper sections of the graph, and lower rates of change correspond to shallower sections of the graph.

The line graph above shows voter turnout, in million of people, for US presidential elections from

1980

2004

The graph lets us identify and compare voter turnout for each election year. For example:

The voter turnout in $1992$ ‍ is approximately $105$ ‍ million people.
The difference in voter turnout between $1988$ ‍ and $2004$ ‍ is approximately $30$ ‍ million people.

We can also make statements about how voter turnout changes over time. For example:

From $1980$ ‍ to $2004$ ‍, voter turnout generally increased.
However, voter turnout decreased between $1984$ ‍ and $1988$ ‍ and between $1992$ ‍ and $1996$ ‍.

Finally, we can make some superlative statements about the rate of change between consecutive election years:

The greatest change in voter turnout between consecutive elections occurred between $2000$ ‍ and $2004$ ‍.
The smallest change in voter turnout between consecutive elections occurred between $1984$ ‍ and $1988$ ‍.

Try it!

try: interpret a line graph

The graph above shows Musutafu school district's enrollment from

2014

2018

From

2014

2018

, the number of students enrolled in the Musutafu school district generally

The school district saw the smallest change in the number of students enrolled between

How do I draw line graphs based on verbal descriptions?

Translating a sequence of events to a line graph

On the SAT, in addition to reading line graphs, we may be asked to select a line graph that represents a given scenario.

These questions tend to be about the correct order of events and the general direction of change. The axes of the graphs are often presented without exact values.

What are some key phrases to look out for?

The table below lists some common key phrases in line graph translation problems and how to interpret them.

Phrase	Shape of graph
"Increases", "rises", "grows"	Upward trend
"Decreases", "drops", "declines"	Downward trend
"Remains constant", "stops", "stays the same"	Flat trend
"Slowly", "gradually"	Shallow slope
"Rapidly", "quickly"	Steep slope

Let's look at an example!

Francisco drives from home to a drive-in movie theater. He parks his car to watch a movie, then drives straight home. Draw a graph that represents Francisco's distance from home as time elapses.

The horizontal axis of the graph represents time, and the vertical axis of the graph represents Francisco's distance from home.

Since Francisco starts from home, his initial distance from home is

0

. Since Francisco drives away from home to the movie theater, his distance from home

increases

Once Francisco gets to the theater, he parks to watch the movie. For the duration of the movie, his distance from home does not change and

remains constant

After the movie, Francisco drives toward home from the movie theater, which means his distance from home

decreases

0

once he gets home.

We can build a line graph like the one shown below using the given information.

Try it!

Try: describe a graph based on a scenario

Marcus wants to surprise his mother with a birthday present. He gradually saves money over the course of several months until he has enough. Then, he holds onto the money for several more months. Right before his mother's birthday, he spends the money he saved all at once on the present.

Before Marcus had enough money for the present, as time elapses, the amount of money he saves

After Marcus saves enough money, but before he buys the present, the amount of money he has

When Marcus spends the money on the present, the amount of money he has

Your turn!

Practice: identify the greatest change

The bar graph above shows the number of women in the

101

st (

1989

1991

) to

105

th (

1997

1999

) US Congresses. The number of women in Congress saw the greatest increase between which of the following Congresses?

Practice: calculate a fraction based on data

Paulina bought her first video game in

2014

. The line graph above shows the total number of video games Paulina owned since then. According to the graph, the number of video games she owned in

2015

is what fraction of the number she owned in

2019

Practice: select a graph that represents a scenario

The

population in a national park declined two years in a row before increasing slightly. Which of the following graphs represents the situation?

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yousafwaleed083
Posted 9 months ago. Direct link to yousafwaleed083's post “Hello! Just wondering, wi...”
Hello! Just wondering, will we be given a sheet of paper for our rough-work during the Math section of the Digital SAT? Or will there be a digital pen on the screen (Like in the exercises on khan academy)?
(47 votes)
- K N
  Posted 9 months ago. Direct link to K N's post “Yes, Sheet of paper will ...”
  Yes, Sheet of paper will be used.
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Maheen Umar
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- maimoonahanif7
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  i do 3! sometimes 2 if the topic tough. just practise a lot, understand concepts, then it wont be intimidating. good luck!
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EmmanuelaP
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this lesson was actually the first easy one I had in Unit 3.
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kaimaoffor
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will you be able to use your own calculator on test day or must it be the one provided on bluebook?
(5 votes)
- RollinToMIT
  Posted 8 months ago. Direct link to RollinToMIT's post “You can use any of the tw...”
  You can use any of the two. Better use the one you are familiar with.
  If bringing you own, read the guidelines for the calculator that are allowed on collegeboard's website.
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the easiest lesson since unit 3! THANKS YOU 💏
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- nwasorjustina
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  I think its best to practice until medium level only if you're stressed and can't keep up with the topic at that time. If that's the case, you can practice until medium level and then come back to it in a few days, it'd be much easier after your brain has gotten a bit used to it. However, don't leave it at medium level and always try to come back and attain Proficiency.
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Very good platform to learn SAT
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my aim is 1500+, do I need any material outside Khan Academy?
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- Isabelle Shield
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  You will. I've noticed that the practice questions here are not as difficult as they are on other SAT practice sites
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