This fall I challenged students in a 200-level writing class to tell a story using a racing bar chart. It was an interesting experiment, and I think, overall, a successful one.
The assignment
Students had their choice of subjects, but we explored several articles on racing bar charts, including “Bar Chart Races Are Everywhere. Here’s Why Some Data Viz Experts Hate Them.” and “Bar Chart Races: Short on Analysis, But Fun to Watch” discussed whether racing bar charts could successfully visualize serious data stories or if racing bar charts should primarily be viewed as entertainment or a “sugar rush.”
I don’t think we ever came to a definitive agreement, and students selected a range of subjects—from popular television shows to the location of forest fires to book publishing trends. Of course, what is a “serious” subject depends on perspective. To someone who just likes to read a novel now and again, publishing trends might not be a serious subject. To someone planning a career in publishing, book trends and sales are serious subjects.
I learned a lot from watching the racing bar charts and found the information presented easy to digest and remember. I had no idea how much The Lion King had dominated Broadway. I was reminded we had bad taste in television in the 80s (seriously, why was The Dukes of Hazzard so popular?). I learned a lot about the evolution of video games as well.
The technology
We used Excel and Flourish, and I told students that the technology would be the easy part of the assignment; finding the story would be the challenging part. In the end, not all students agreed with me, but I think students did a great job exploring both platforms. No one had previous experience with Flourish, and three or four students were familiar with Excel. While not everyone enjoyed creating the spreadsheet, most students found the technologies relatively easy to use. Flourish’s tutorials are top-notch (and include one on creating cumulative data in Excel), and I created some of my own as well.
Some specifics
Students had a week to research and complete their racing bar chart. Everyone had to include a minimum combined 20 rows and columns of data (some went well beyond this—one project included over 240 rows of data). Everyone needed to include categories—to make the chart interactive—and everyone needed to include captions. Captions were the biggest issue, I think. Some students were frustrated with the options for placing the captions (and ended up removing them), and I’m not certain they always added much to the chart. Everyone was also asked to make their data cumulative—just to learn how to make data cumulative in Excel. Finally, everyone had to write a couple paragraphs about the story they were trying to tell and about their process.
Most students said they would use Flourish again if they had a project that required charts or other types of data visualizations. Overall, I think most of the racing bar charts were well done, and I was particularly pleased with students’ creativity and adaptability. Many students had to adjust their topics based on the data they could find.
Two students volunteered (or perhaps more accurately said yes when I asked) to share their work. Kayla Bogan’s chart explores Broadway theater and shows that since 2000 The Lion King has made more money than any other Broadway show. Both Hamilton and Wicked have impressive numbers as well (particularly given that they debuted after The Lion King). Lily VanMiddlesworth’s chart takes a look at some of the best-selling books from 2017 – 2023 and provides insight into how much BookTok and other online social platforms have influenced book sales.
“Highest Grossing Broadway Shows” by Kayla Bogan
Exploring the evolution of Broadway over the last 20 years brings a sense of nostalgia. Through the years, cultural changes have impacted Broadway themes and narratives showcasing the differences in time. In the early 2000s, classic Broadway shows like The Producers were the powerhouses of Broadway, along with Disney classics like The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast. When the mega-musical Wicked premiered in 2003, it quickly became the top competition for The Lion King and remained one of the highest-grossing shows of all time.
In the 2010s, there was an uptick in jukebox and movie musicals, bringing a new era to Broadway. When Hamilton, an innovative hip-hop musical about American history featuring a diverse cast, premiered in 2015, it quickly became a cultural phenomenon. Hamilton then became a favorite behind Wicked and The Lion King.
However, when the 2020 pandemic hit, Broadway went dark for the longest time in history, losing billions of dollars in revenue. Fortunately, by 2022, Broadway was back in full force, with The Lion King still leading.
Overall, exploring the different categories of Broadway shows, compared to their respective years and grosses, helps tell a nostalgic and informative story of shifting preferences, innovation, and resilience over the last 20 years of Broadway.
Some of my biggest challenges of the project were making the data cumulative and ensuring everything fit in the Flourish chart. At first, it was a little confusing, but after troubleshooting, I overcame the challenges and completed my racing bar chart. Overall, I’m happy with how my chart turned out. I think another approach could have been exploring overall tickets sold instead of total grosses. I’m curious to know if the results would have been different. The Flourish platform was fun to play around and work in, and I would love to incorporate it into future projects.
“Best-Selling Books in the U.S. 2017-2023″ by Lily Vanmiddlesworth
The American book market has changed dramatically over the past decade, evolving from a business once heavily dependent on personal relationships into a game of digital savvy and nimble marketing. The 2000s saw books and book series such as Harry Potter, The Hunger Games, and Twilight rise to fame, delighting fans of fantasy, action, adventure, and romance. Though technology changed the publishing game, readers’ obsessions with well-crafted fantasy and romance continue to strike the upper end of the charts. Books are still flowing off the shelves, whether said “shelves” are in physical, Kindle, or audio form, and a good part of it now has to do with TikTok and Instagram where users can find and pitch to their niche communities in BookTok and Bookstagram.
While this chart only follows a select number of books from 2017 – 2023, it is obvious that, with the exception of Dr. Seuss’ Oh, The Places You’ll Go and Prince Harry’s Spare, women are leading the charge. Colleen Hoover topped the charts in 2022 and 2023 with her romance-packed novels It Starts with Us and It Ends with Us, showing how the modern market is a place of possibility where almost anyone with a voice can garner success and find a group that will eagerly await for the next page.
As the chart visualizes, adult fiction, romance, and fantasy took readers by storm. Well-crafted fiction that follows empowering women along with authors who are not afraid to break the rules and explore what it means to be human through adventurous and fantastical worlds and circumstances seem to be the keys to success in today’s marketplace. Fantastic fiction is also here to stay, and these risk-taking authors are proof that anyone can be a bestseller if they engage with modern tools.
The Excel set-up and data collection were a big struggle, as many platforms that track book sales require payments and subscriptions. I love the platform Flourish! It is easy to use and incredibly helpful. If I were to work with it more, I’m sure my love for its abilities would only grow.
Final thoughts
Overall, I was pleased with the assignment and what the students created. Racing bar charts may be a sugar rush, but they are fun, which I think makes them a great way to introduce students, particularly students who aren’t studying subjects that traditionally include a lot of data-specific courses, to data and data storytelling. I hope having a (primarily) positive experience with the racing bar charts will encourage students to work more with data in the future and to think about other ways data can be used to tell a story.
After graduating from Auburn University, Catherine Ramsdell became an educator. Her interests are oddly varied, but she enjoys teaching anything that involves a good story—from brand storytelling to mythology to data journalism.
