Chart assignment

Charts to read and discuss

Read each chart, then answer its questions. Every chart shows its source and date; open it for a table of the numbers and the data to download.

  1. How many points does a college football team score per game?
  2. Where does US electricity come from?

Chart 1 of 2 · College football

How many points does a college football team score per game?

The interactive chart needs JavaScript. The numbers are on the chart's page.

A college football team scored 26.2 points a game on average in 2025, in regular-season games between two FBS (top-division) teams, up from 9.8 in 1900. Scoring peaked at 29.1 in 2016. The dip to 23.5 in 2006 came in the one season the clock was started sooner, which cut plays. Before 1912 a touchdown was worth 5 points, not 6. The chart starts in 1900; CollegeFootballData.com's records before then cover only a few dozen such games a season.

Questions to discuss

  1. In one sentence of your own, what does this chart show?
  2. Find the biggest change or difference in the chart. What might explain it?
  3. Who collected these numbers, and how recent are they? What else would you want to know before drawing a conclusion?

Source: CollegeFootballData.com, college football games (CollegeFootballData.com terms of use (factual data, credited to CollegeFootballData.com)) · Data as of Jan 20, 2026

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Chart 2 of 2 · Energy

Where does US electricity come from?

The interactive chart needs JavaScript. The numbers are on the chart's page.

In 2025 natural gas made 40.8% of US electricity, followed by nuclear (17.7%) and coal (16.6%). Wind made 10.5% and solar 6.7%. Solar counts only utility-scale plants, not rooftop panels, and the 2025 figures are preliminary.

How to read this chart

Each bar is one energy source's share of all the electricity made in the U.S. in a year, so the bars add up to about 100%. The bars start at zero, so a bar twice as long means twice the share. Solar counts only large power plants, not panels on rooftops.

Questions to discuss

  1. Which source makes the most electricity? About how many times more than the smallest bar?
  2. Which of these sources burn fuel and which don't? What share of electricity comes from each group?
  3. Why might a chart of this kind look different in your state than for the whole country?

Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration, Monthly Energy Review (Table 7.2a) (Public domain (U.S. government work)) · Data as of Dec 31, 2025

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