Cool Creative Communications: Dazzling Data Visualization

The amount of data around us are increasing at an incredible rate. Data Visualization enables us to quickly glean insights and patterns from data and communicate its key aspects intuitively, persuasively, and memorably. In this session, participants will discuss the fundamental principles of effective visual data communication as they critique and evaluate existing visualizations. They will also locate sources for downloadable data, and develop simple interactive visualizations using Tableau Public, a free and popular data visualization tool.  Students will complete assigned exercises that they will share with their class peers. Class participants are expected to spend 1.5 hours on content learning, 3 hours preparing their class assignments, and .5 hours on peer critique.

Objectives

By the end of this course, participants will be able to:

• Locate downloadable data sets and describe spreadsheet formatting requirements
• Develop data visualizations using Tableau Public
• Critique data visualizations using an evaluation model
• Describe fundamental principles of visual design as they apply to existing visualizations

Course Materials - (Updated 7/2019)

PowerPoint 
Data Sources
Peer Evaluation
Tools
Tableau Public Guide

Continuing Education

• MLA Course Listing

Course Developer

Tony Nguyen, MLIS, AHIP, Executive Director, NNLM SEA
Kiri Burcat, MLIS, Data and Evaluation Coordinator, NNLM SEA