Thinking via Pictures: Getting Students Started through Graphing

Visual languages are among the most important to the STEM disciplines, but most students entering a STEM curriculum seem to have little ability to think or converse in any visual language.Further, there are few curricula that include a formal course in either basic graphics or the art of approximation.One foundational visual language is that of two-dimensional presentation of quantitative information and mathematical relationships.This paper offers some topics to consider for those interested in helping students (1) build basic skills in producing graphs quickly and (2) gain experience in thinking about and understanding relationships, using graphs as aids.