Teaching Sequence

Work through this resource material in the following sequence:

10 minutes – Part A: Introduction – What Are The Chances?
15 minutes – Part B: Living Past 12 Months?
60+ minutes – Part C: Sharing Statistics Using Infographics
5 minutes – Reflection

Part A: Introduction – What Are The Chances?

Step 1.

Introduce the lesson by informing students that they will be investigating probability and chance through the topic of organ and tissue donation and transplantation. Assure the class that if they’re not familiar with the topic, that’s ok – they’ll have the opportunity to become more informed about the topic throughout this lesson.

Step 2.

Hand out a copy of the Student Worksheet to each student. Assign every student within your class an individual number. This will be referred to as their ‘ID Number’.

Invite students to record their ID Number in the space provided on the Student Worksheet. This ID Number will be used to represent the statistics of life-threatening illnesses and organ transplants in Australia using different scenarios in Step 4.

Step 3.

Next, using the ‘Number of students’ column from the Scenario Table below as a guide, randomly select student ID Numbers to show how these statistics can be represented as a relative frequency. Explain to students that when their number is drawn out, they will need to stand up.

Work through scenario one by randomly selecting eight ID Numbers. This can be done with a electronic number generator or by pulling numbers out of a hat. Once selected, explain to the class that these students are representing the ratio of people ‘at risk of developing chronic kidney disease’ if the class represented the whole Australian population.

Step 4.

Continue working through each of the scenarios to highlight how statistics can be represented and interpreted in different situations. Encourage discussion with each scenario to gauge how students feel about these statistics.

If the class represented the whole Australian population
Scenario (based on Australians over the age of 18)	Statistic	Number of students (a class of 25)	Explanation
Is at risk of developing chronic kidney disease	1 in 3	8 - draw out 8 ID numbers from 1–25	People who are at risk include those with diabetes, high blood pressure or heart problems as well as those who are obese, a smoker or over 60.
Has chronic kidney disease	1 in 10	2–3 - select 2–3 students from previous group	1.7 million Australians have indicators of CKD
Knows that they have chronic kidney disease	Less than 10% of sufferers	Choose one student from the last group. Explain that this is 3x more than the real statistic	1.5 million Australians do not realise they have indicators of CKD

If the class represented the portion of the Australian population undergoing treatment for renal replacement therapy (Approx. 24,000 people).
Scenario (based on Australians over the age of 18)	Statistic	Number of students (a class of 25)	Explanation
Those on dialysis	53%	13 *draw out 13 students	Dialysis is required when CKD is in end stage, and the kidneys are failing
On the waiting list for a kidney transplant	8%	2 - select two from the previous group	The average wait for a kidney transplant is 3–4 years.
Received a kidney transplant in the year	33% of the waiting list	1 *select from last group	75%* of kidney transplants were from deceased donors

Source: Kidney Health Australia – The values with a * were calculated using source information.

Part B: Living Past 12 Months?

Step 1.

Watch 'Woody's Story' from the Dying to Live documentary. Before viewing, you may want to explain that Woody has had an auto-immune disorder since childhood and moved between dialysis and kidney transplants all his life.

Dying to Live: Woody's Story (https://youtu.be/NaJUbRT345U)

Step 2.

After viewing Woody’s Story, facilitate a class discussion focusing on what students found interesting about his story and how statistics were included.

Step 3.

Share the following quote from Woody’s story with the class, either by reading it out aloud or writing it up on the board (it can also be found on the Student Worksheet).

Take a minute here to explain to your class that antibodies are part of the body’s immune system and are the ‘stored instructions’ that tell the body how to fight an infection it has already had. When you come down with an illness you haven’t had before, your immune system creates new antibodies to fight this illness and will store these instructions too. Antibodies are specific to a person and can sometimes recognise foreign tissue (e.g. a transplanted kidney) as a pathogen and aim to reject the new organ. Medication can be used to overcome this.

Step 4.

Ask students to fill out a THINK PUZZLE EXPLORE table on the Student Worksheet, based on the quote, and Woody’s story.

If groups are struggling, you could prompt them with the following questions:

What do you know about organ transplant?
What information did this video explain?
What questions did you have about Woody needing three kidney transplants?
What do you understand about Woody’s explanation of antibodies?
What do you think might happen to Woody?

Step 5.

Once students have added their own ideas to the table, ask them to pair up and review what they have written. Encourage pairs to share their main ideas and questions with the class. Questions could include:

How long does it take to get an organ?
How would the timelines change if the deceased donor rate improved?
How do you get put on the waiting list?
How often does organ rejection happen?
What is the usual organ success rate?
What are the timelines for each phase?

Step 6.

Hand out to each student a copy of the Kidney Transplant Factsheet . Explain to students that they will now read through this information individually to begin finding answers to their questions and exploring the topic further.

Part C: Sharing Statistics Using Infographics

Step 1.

Once students have researched and found relevant information, and possibly statistics to help answer their questions, explain to students that they will now share their information though the creation of an infographic poster.

This task can be completed individually or in pairs with the purpose to inform the community about organ donation and transplantation using statistics. DonateLife have previously made infographics to share their facts and statistics about organ and tissue donation and to increase awareness of the issue. This DonateLife infographic could be used as an example to show students how organ and tissue statistics can be presented using visual representations.

Invite students to select three pieces of information that they would like to present to help tell their 'story' or information about the topic. Invite them to place this information in the 'Information' column of the planning table in the Infographics Planning Tool .

Step 2.

Explain to students that they must now find relevant statistics that support their information and can be communicated using pictorial and visual representations. They may use the Kidney Transplant Factsheet from Part B or conduct further research on their own. The Donate Life Facts and Statistics webpage is a useful starting point.

Step 3.

Once students have found their statistics, they will need to add them to the 'Research' column of the planning table in the Infographics Planning Tool. These statistics will be then used to create their infographic poster.

Step 4.

Explain that students will need to manipulate their data to create their infographics (e.g. relative frequency could be used to estimate the probability). These calculations will be included in the final 'Application' column of the Planning Table in the Infographics Planning Tool.

Encourage students to be creative in their approach as there are many different ways to develop mathematical models. The suggestions below may be helpful as a starting point:

Use probabilities, averages and other values that have been given (e.g. 20% of people are approved for _____ so 20% of of an image could be shaded, or 20% is 1 in 5, so 1 out 5 images could be highlighted)
Calculate the relative frequency and use this as the probability of that particular event occurring (e.g. 5 in every 15 people are subject to _____ → 5/15 = 0.3333 so there is a 33% chance of this happening in the real world).

Step 5.

Once students have finished their planning, allow time for them to be creative in making their infographics and encourage them to share them with the class.

Reflection

Step 1.

Encourage your class to think back to the requirements of being approved for the organ transplant waiting list. Project or write up the following statement onto the board:

Also, remind your class of Woody’s quote from his story:
“... My doctor said I’ve only got really, like a 1 in 5 chance of living past 12 months.”

Step 2.

Ask students to respond to the following questions in the space provided on the Student Worksheet:

What have I learnt today about organ and tissue donation?
How effectively have I used chance and statistics in my infographics?
Three things I can explain to someone at home about the chance and statistics of organ and tissue donation are...

Differentiated Learning

Extension – The infographics in this lesson could be extended to allow for students to select and investigate an organ or tissue of their choice.

Provisions for Learning Support – Students may be given infographic templates to use with the statistics and information provided in factsheets.

Teacher Reflection

Take this opportunity to reflect on your own teaching:

What did you learn about your teaching today?
What worked well?
What didn't work so well?
What would you share?
Where to next?
How are you going to get there?

Dying to Live - Real World Probabilities

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