Teacher's Resource Page

The objective of this activity is for students to be able to create and record a baseball team's roster on an Excel spreadsheet developed from player statistics obtained from the Internet's Major League Baseball Website. Students will be able to use the spreadsheet to compute team totals and batting averages.

Materials:

Individual student computers
Microsoft Excel software
Internet access to the Major League Baseball site
Directions provided in the process section of this Webquest
Excel Help Guide (see below)
Paper and pencil

This activity was developed for use in an eighth grade math class. Students in our middle school have their own laptops, so computer availability is not an issue. Also by eighth grade, most students have had experience with excel.

This unit will last about a week depending on your student's computer knowledge. My students have had some basic experience using the internet and excel. We were able to finish the assignment and give presentations in 5 days.

I assigned the leagues and divisions by putting the names of each (AL East, AL Central, AL West, NL East, NL Central, and NL West) on pieces of paper and had students draw from a hat. It is ok, and even a bit more competitive, to have some students working in the same divisions.

Some other ideas or variations are:

have students work with a partner instead of individually
assign extra credit for the most creative mascot
assign extra credit for the team in each class who had the best batting average

Excel Help Guide - I make a copy of this help guide that I developed and give it to each student. It saves a lot of time that would be spent answering questions about how to perform a specific function of the excel program. Of course, depending on your students level of experience with excel, you will still have to provide some guidance.

If you have questions or comments about this WebQuest feel free to contact me, Heidi Shultz at hshultz@chs.cville.k12.in.us

Excel Help Guide

To make the presentation of your team the best it can be, follow these helpful tips for creating a great spreadsheet.

1) Adjust the width of each column to be just as big as it needs to be. To do this, highlight the entire field of data, then select Format, column and the AutoFit selection.

2) Sort your players either alphabetically or by individual batting average. To do this highlight the entire field of data (or you will just sort the highlighted column mixing up the statistics), and then go to data and sort. When prompted, select the column which you want to sort by. If you are sorting alphabetically, select ascending. If you are sorting by batting averages, select descending. Then click on OK. Your information will be sorted. Or you can use the shortcut icons on your tool bar (but remember to highlight the entire field of data).

3) Compute totals for each column of data. This can be done quickly by highlighting the columns that you want totals for, then clicking on the auto sum button. (You do not want to find a total for the batting averages; you want to find the average of the averages. See step 4)

4) Compute the whole team's batting average by clicking on the cell in which you want the average to appear. Then type in =AVERAGE(start:end), start should be the cell you wish to start with (where the first players batting average is), and end should be the last cell you wish to include (the last players batting average). Hit the enter key and the average will appear in the cell.

5) Be sure to put your team's name at the top of your spreadsheet. You might have to insert some rows to the top of your chart. To do this, highlight the top row of data and go to insert then rows. You can also jazz up the appearance of your team's name by using the WordArt option. Click on the icon and follow the directions. You can move the team name by clicking on the corners and putting it where you want. You can also change the color and choose other options using the WordArt toolbar.

6) Put your name at the bottom of your spreadsheet using the footer option. To do this, go to view and then header and footer. Select custom footer and type your name in the center section.

7) Be sure that all of the batting averages in your table are expressed to the nearest thousandths place. To do this, highlight the batting average column and then click on the increase decimal button until you have three decimal places.

8) Use some of the many other options that Microsoft Excel offers to make your Baseball team's roster easy to read and nice to look at. Maybe you want to center each column so that numbers appear directly below their labels. You might want to add a border or grid lines to your table. Be sure to select a font style and size that is easy read. Investigate the icons on the toolbar in your spreadsheet and view more options by clicking on the arrow.

*NOTE: Your entire roster should be on one sheet.

Page created by Heidi Shultz. Last updated April 30, 2003