We will discuss the use of graphs to communicate statistical data.  The basic types of graphs to be discussed are:  pictographs, line plots, pie charts, map charts, histograms, bar graphs, line graphs, frequency polygons, scatter plots, stem and leaf diagrams and box plots.  A simple introduction is on a Charts and Graphs page for middle school students. The Information Graphics site on Wikipedia has a good overview.  Several are described on the Mathland Website. The stem and leaf and box and whiskers graphs are better explained on Steve Simon's page. Michael Friendly's Gallery of Data Visualation is a collection of interesting graphs.  Many of the graphs are more complex than one can do in Excel, but lots of good graphics software is available, such as OriginLab..  The Stem and Leaf you can just type, you would have to draw a boxplot or find software that does it.   Here are some variatons of line graphs.  Drug War graphs.  Trend graphs are very widely used in financial analysis, see Yahoo Finance. You can use Create-A-Graph from the National Center for Educational Statistics to make graphs which can be saved in jpeg format and inserted into reports.




Story on Philadelphia Shootings:

Posted on Sun, Feb. 18, 2007   

Philadelphia Inquirer graphs about shootings in the city. 
Phila. shootings up 31% since '01
On average, about five people were shot every day last year, totaling 2,004. The victims were primarily black males.
By Robert Moran

INQUIRER STAFF WRITER

Khamphay Salienkham, 37, was taking out the trash the night of Aug. 23 in South Philadelphia when he was confronted by four men who had come to rob him.

After beating him in the head with a pistol, one of the men shot him three times. Salienkham, a Laotian immigrant, spent two weeks in the hospital. Then he moved away from Philadelphia.

"I had to get away," he said.

Salienkham was one of Philadelphia's 2,004 shooting victims last year. That is the most the city has recorded since 2001, the earliest year for which the Philadelphia Police Department was able to provide statistics. Last year's total was 31 percent higher than the 1,528 recorded in 2001.

Much has been written about the 406 homicides in the city last year. Less has been noted about the fact that, on average, about five people were shot every day last year in the City of Brotherly Love.

Of the total, 235 - or 11.7 percent - were under 18. An additional 895 - nearly 45 percent - were ages 18 to 25.

Like the city's homicides, the shootings were most numerous in North Philadelphia, West and Southwest Philadelphia, and parts of South Philadelphia.

More than 75 percent - 1,509 - of the shooting victims were black males.

There are various theories for why gun violence has risen, but it is clear that Philadelphia is awash in guns.

In 2006, police confiscated 5,386 guns, 7 percent more than the 5,028 guns seized in 2005, according to a city Web site for Operation Safer Streets, Mayor Street's initiative launched a year ago to reduce violent crime.

"I don't recall another year when we confiscated so many guns," Police Commissioner Sylvester M. Johnson, a 42-year veteran of the force, said in December.

Lawrence W. Sherman, a criminologist at the University of Pennsylvania, noted that many of the shootings occurred in Philadelphia's poorest neighborhoods, which are mainly African American. The more affluent, the more white the neighborhood, the fewer the shooting incidents.

"We have to recognize the role of concentrated black poverty," said Sherman, director of the Jerry Lee Center of Criminology at Penn.

He said the increasing violence reflected "a systematic placement of black males at the bottom of the social structure," where they feel rejected and become prone to violent behavior.

With shootings heavily confined to poor, black neighborhoods, "the untold story, the story the hotels want you to write," Sherman said, is that Philadelphia is "a very safe place for white people."

According to Police Department statistics, there were 341 "white" shooting victims. But the police also include Hispanics in that category, so there is no breakdown for Caucasians.

As shootings rise and the number of hospitalizations increases, so does the cost.

According to a 2005 report by the Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council, the cost of hospitalizations because of gunshots by assault was $102.5 million statewide in 2001-03, compared with $49 million in 1996-98.

Services for crime victims also feel the strain.

"As the number of shooting victims increases, there has been an increase in the number of victims seeking assistance," said Tobi Downing, a program director with the Anti-Violence Partnership of Philadelphia.

"A victim of gun violence could be dealing with health care, insurance and financial issues. They could be missing work and dealing with complicated psychological issues, all as the result of one bullet," Downing said.

Salienkham worked in construction until he was shot last summer.

Now he can't work because of his injuries.

He lives with a sister in Lancaster County and tries to help around the house, but he relies on his family to take care of him.

Salienkham knew the four men who attacked him because they hung out on the street in his neighborhood. They were Asian like him.

He believes they targeted him because he made good money from his previous work.

He comes to Philadelphia to visit family members, but he doesn't stay long.

"I'm scared," he said.

To view interactive maps charting every shooting and homicide in Philadelphia in 2006, and for recent coverage of violence in the region, go to http://go.philly.com/violence