Thinking about handling data

Data comes in many different forms, and often the form you find the data, or create data, is different from the way you might wish to use it to support an argument, or present in a report.

It is useful to be able to carry out some simple manipulations of data so that you can make good use of it to support what you want to argue. It is also important to work out whether playing around with numbers is something you enjoy or not.

Often, when students arrive at university, they find that they have forgotten much of the maths they learnt at school and they need support to get back into the mode of solving numerical problems. Subjects requiring mathematics will require different skills, but the process of providing supporting data as evidence for an argument is similar across many disciplines. Most places will offer help with this, and the videos in the following steps give you a taste of the sort of support you might receive.

In the next steps there are some problems for you to solve. With each set of problems there are videos of a university maths tutor, taking you through each example. You need to think about not only whether you find them easy or difficult, but also how you feel about tackling each type of question.