On 9 February 2009, Chelsea football club sacked their manager. He had only been in the job since 1 July 2008.

Chelsea said that results and performances were deteriorating and that sacking him was the only option.

In Scolari’s time in charge, Chelsea won 20 matches, drew 10 and lost six.

Scolari had been in charge of Chelsea for 224 days, 36 matches and had earned £3.07 million.

He was guaranteed a pay-off of more than £5 million.

Did Chelsea have no other option? Were things really that bad?

The ‘blogosphere’ is full of people trying to explain why they think Scolari should have been sacked, or why they think he was worth the money and should still be running the club.

Pick a colour for your group.

Are you red or yellow?

Use the results from the season’s games and the Premiership league table to write a blog entry.

If you picked red you must write a blog entry using the data to explain why it was right to sack Scolari.

If you picked yellow you must write a blog entry using the data to explain why it was wrong to sack Scolari.

You can only use the data that you are given to back up your point of view.

Up2d8 mathsSack him or back him?

Teacher Notes

Sack him or back him?

Introduction: The back pages seem to show a constant stream of Premiership managers coming and going, sometimes after just a fewmonths in charge. This resource uses the departure of Luiz Felipe Scolari, the ex-Chelsea manager, as a context for students to explore theway that data can be manipulated and interpreted.

Content objectives: - Calculate statistics and select those most appropriate to the problem or which address the questions raised - Select, construct and modify - on paper and using ICT - suitable graphical representations to progress an enquiry

and identify key features present in the data - Write about and discuss the results of a statistical enquiry using ICT as appropriate; justify the methods used.

Process objectives: These will depend on the amount of freedom you allow your class with the activity. It might be worth considering howyou’re going to deliver the activity and highlighting the processes that this will allow on the diagram below.

Activity: Students are introduced to the Scolari story and presented with some data in the first few slides (the data is available as a printout inthe student worksheets). Students (working in pairs or small groups) are then asked to use the data to either show that Chelsea were right tosack Scolari or to use the same data to show that they have made a mistake and should have backed him and kept him on. (In the PowerPoint,the decision about what each group is arguing for is made randomly, removing any personal opinion from the investigation and encouraging thestudents to rely entirely on the data.) Each group is asked to write a blog entry using only the data given to present their case..

Differentiation: You may decide to change the level of challenge for your group. To make the task easier you could consider:• simplifying the data. For example, only present the groups with the last 10 matches of Scolari’s time at Chelsea• providing a writing frame• scaffolding the task more rigorously. For example, asking that students draw a graph or calculate the averages that will back their case To make the task more difficult you could consider:• giving less scaffolding to the task• allowing the students to compare the data for Chelsea with that of other clubs (data for Manchester United and Stoke City)• allowing the students to respond to and comment on each others’ blogs.This resource is designed to be adapted to your requirements.

Outcomes: The outcome of the task as it’s presented is a blog entry. The informal nature of the blog allows students to write in a way that iscloser to the way that they might talk and that is familiar to them. You might choose to use this less formal way of writing as scaffolding to amore formal outcome – maybe a newspaper article or a dialogue between two football pundits.

Working in groups: This activity lends itself to paired or small group work and, by encouraging students to work collaboratively, it is likely thatyou will allow them access to more of the key processes than if they were to work individually. You will need to think about how your class willwork on this task. Will they work in pairs, threes or larger groups? If pupils are not used to working in groups in mathematics, you may wish tospend some time talking about their rules and procedures to maximise the effectiveness and engagement of pupils in group work (You maywish to look at the SNS Pedagogy and practice pack Unit 10: Guidance for Groupwork). You may wish to encourage the groups to delegatedifferent areas of responsibility to specific group members - some of the group could look at the first task only for example.

Assessment: You may wish to consider how you will assess the task and how you will record your assessment. This could include developingthe assessment criteria with your class. You might choose to focus on the content objectives or on the process objectives. You might decide

thatthis activity lends itself to comment only marking or to student self-assessment. If you decide that the outcome is to be a presentation or aposter then you may find that this lends itself to peer assessment.

Probing questions: Initially students could brainstorm issues to consider. You may wish to introduce some points into the discussion whichmight include:• What type of statistics would convince you of an argument?• Is it useful to find the average number of goals scored? Would that support your case?• What other factors might have an influence that we don’t have data for?

You will need: The PowerPoint display which you might read through with your class to set the scene at the beginning of the activity. There are six slides:

The first three slides introduce the story and show some of the results achieved by Chelsea under Scolari.

The fourth slide introduces the idea of a football blog and models the tone and style of writing used in some blogs.

The final two slides give the students the task. The fifth slide asks them to choose a colour which then, in the sixth slide, relates to which side of the argument they should take. You may choose to decide which group argues which way by presenting different groups with red or yellow cards.

Up2d8 mathsSack him or back him?

Student resource sheets

Chelsea results from espnsoccernet.com

Manchester United results from espnsoccernet.com

Stoke City results from espnsoccernet.com

League tables from Statto.com