Focus On: Academics

Art Appreciation
Art Appreciation students learn graphic design basics by creating a two-dimensional interpretation of their self-portrait photographs. Visually simplifying the three-dimensional world is how graphic artists efficiently communicate their ideas.

Candy Grab – AP Statistics
This year, we are pleased to have added to our Advanced Placement offerings. Our students are now able to complete AP Statistics. The course introduces students to the major concepts and tools for collecting, analyzing, and drawing conclusions from data. The four themes evident in the content, skills, and assessment – exploring data, sampling and experimentation, probability and simulation, and statistical inference – are carefully interwoven throughout the curriculum. Technology is used to build conceptual understanding. Upon completion of AP Statistics, the students completed the AP Statistics Examination toward securing college credit.

The Candy Grab activity gave the students the opportunity to collect, analyze, and interpret real data to see if students with a larger hand span can grab more candy than students with a smaller hand span. Scatterplots and correlation were constructed and analyzed. What does the correlation coefficient tell us?  How confident are we in the predictions made by the least – squares linear regression model? How do we interpret the coefficient of determination? Other than hand span, what other explanatory variables could have influenced the outcome?

Upon reflection, it was determined that there was a strong, positive, linear relationship between hand span and number of candies grabbed. Other opportunities to collect and analyze data will follow. We became knowledgeable of the fact that newspapers and websites are notorious for portraying a correlation as a casual relationship in their headlines to get more people to read their articles. Understanding statistics makes us educated consumers.

AP US History and US 1 Honors
MHC Academy students from AP US History and US 1 Honors attended the annual Abram Kartch/Thomas Jefferson Lecture Series at William Paterson University (Wayne, NJ) along with teacher, Mr. Dunn. The series is devoted to exploring the thoughts, accomplishments, and influence of our third president. The day included a lesson, a Q & A session, and an essay contest.