From Data to Report
Three tools. One question. One report. You'll design a short survey, turn the answers into real analysis, and write it all up as a finished document.
The scenario
You've been asked to investigate a question about your own class — something like how people actually spend their study time, which tools they use daily, or what they'd change about their courses. Nobody has this data yet. You're going to collect it, make sense of it, and hand over a report someone could actually act on.
That's the whole point of this WebQuest: three everyday tools — Forms, Excel, and Word — aren't separate skills you learn in isolation. They're one workflow. What you build in Quest I becomes the raw material for Quest II, and what you find in Quest II becomes the evidence in Quest III.
By the end, you won't just know how each tool works — you'll know how they connect, because you'll have used them together to produce one real thing.
Why this feels different from a normal assignment
This WebQuest follows Design Thinking — a five-stage process for turning a real problem into an evidence-based recommendation. You're not collecting data for its own sake: every quest below is one stage of this process, and each tool (Forms, Excel, Word) is simply how you do that stage.
Empathize
Understand a real problem or need people around you actually have.
Quest I · FormsDefine
Turn what you heard into one focused, answerable question.
Quest I · FormsAnalyze
Make sense of the responses — numbers, patterns, what stands out.
Quest II · ExcelBuild a recommendation
Package your evidence into a clear, structured proposal.
Quest III · WordTest
Present your findings to others and see how the recommendation holds up.
Quest IV · PresentAccess
Share your findings clearly and reflect on what you'd ask differently next time.
Quest IV · PresentIn "real" Design Thinking these stages loop back on each other — you re-test, re-define, and try again. In this WebQuest you'll move through them once, start to finish, across four lectures — but keep the mindset: a good report isn't just "here's some data," it's "here's what we learned and what should happen next."
What you'll hand in
One final report (Word document, roughly 2–4 pages) that documents your whole investigation, built from the outputs of all three quests:
The question and the survey
What you wanted to find out, and how your survey (from Quest I) was designed to get at it.
The data and the analysis
What the responses actually showed — key numbers, a chart, and what stands out (from Quest II).
The write-up
A clearly structured document with a title page, headings, and your chart embedded — built the right way in Word (Quest III).
Nothing here is thrown away. Every quest produces something you carry forward — a form, a data file, a chart — into the next one, and finally into the report.
The whole workflow runs across four lectures: Forms (3h), Excel (3h), Word (2h), and a final lecture (2h) where you present your findings and hand in the report. Each quest below tells you exactly what happens in its lecture and what to finish before the next one.
Forms — ask a real question
Goal: design and launch a short survey that will give you honest, usable answers. Design Thinking stage: Empathize + Define.
- Intro to Design Thinking and how it connects to this project
- Brainstorm and pick a real problem worth investigating
- Write your focused research question / hypothesis
- Forms basics — question types and good survey design
- Build your own survey in Forms
- Peer review — swap surveys and give feedback before sending
Pick one focused question
Not "tell me about your studying" — something specific and answerable, like "How many hours a week do you spend on independent study, and where?"
Build the form
5–8 questions, mixing choice questions (easy to count later) with at most one open-text question. Keep it short enough that people actually finish it.
Test it yourself first
Fill it in as if you were a respondent. If a question confuses you, it will confuse everyone else too.
Send it and collect responses
Share the link with your class and gather at least 15 - 20 responses before moving on.
Export your responses to Excel (Forms does this in one click, under "Responses" → "Open in Excel"). That file is your starting point for the next quest.
For your report — make sure you've captured this from Quest I:Empathize
- Description of the problem from the user's perspective — whose point of view you're looking at the problem from
- Justification for choosing the topic — why this problem matters, and where the observation or inspiration came from
- Characteristics of the target group — who the problem affects
- Initial observations/assumptions before data collection — what you noticed or suspected before researching
- Source of insight into user needs — personal observation, informal conversations, prior experience, or literature
Define
- Clearly formulated research problem / research question
- Hypothesis — the predicted relationship between variables (X affects Y in group Z)
- Defined variables — what exactly is being measured
- Scope and limitations of the study — what it does NOT cover
- Justification for why this question matters/is valuable
- Brief reference to the question-quality checklist (optional)
Ideate
- Description of possible approaches/ideas for investigating the problem, and why this one was chosen
- List of survey questions with justification — why each question relates to the hypothesis
- Design decisions about the tool (Forms) — question type, order, survey length, and why
- Brief reference to the survey-question quality checklist (optional)
Excel — turn answers into evidence
Goal: clean up your exported responses and find out what they actually mean. Design Thinking stage: Analyze.
- Check-in — did you collect enough responses?
- Export from Forms and clean up the data
- Formulas and pivot tables —
AVERAGE,COUNTIF,MAX/MIN - Build the one chart that best tells your story
- Discussion — what do the results actually mean?
- From data to recommendation — bridging into Quest III
Open and tidy the export
Remove the columns you don't need (timestamps, IDs), and make sure each column has a clear header.
Calculate the basics
Use formulas — AVERAGE, COUNTIF, MAX/MIN — to summarize your data: averages, most common answer, spread of responses.
Build one chart that tells the story
Choose the chart type that fits your data (bar for comparing categories, line for change over something ordered) — not whichever one looks fanciest.
Write down what you notice
One or two sentences, in plain language: what does this data actually show? You'll need this for the report.
Keep your chart and your key figures (the numbers, not just the raw table) — you'll insert them directly into your Word report.
For your report — make sure you've captured this from Quest II:Prototype
- Description of the draft version of the survey
- Information about pilot testing (if conducted) and what feedback came up
- Changes made after piloting/consultation, and why
- Final version of the research tool — link/screenshot
Test
- Description of the data collection process — number of respondents, how the group was reached, duration
- Analysis of results (Excel) — tables, charts, basic descriptive statistics answering the research question
- Answer to the hypothesis — whether the data confirms, refutes, or is inconclusive
- Study limitations — what may have affected the results (small sample, respondent selection, self-reported data)
- Conclusions and possible next steps — practical takeaways, what's worth investigating further
Word — write it up properly
Goal: package the question, the data, and the findings into one clean, structured document. Design Thinking stage: Build a recommendation.
- What makes a good report — structure and expectations
- Exercise — turn your data into one clear recommendation
- Word essentials — heading styles, table of contents, embedding charts
- Work time — write, with the instructor available for questions
- Submission checklist for the final report
Set up the structure first
Use built-in Heading styles (not bold text) for your sections: Introduction, Survey Design, Findings, Conclusion. This is what makes a table of contents possible.
Insert an automatic table of contents
Once your headings are styled, Word can generate this for you — no manual typing or page-counting.
Bring in your chart
Paste the chart from Excel into the Findings section, and reference it in your text ("as shown in the chart below...").
Write the conclusion last
One short paragraph: what did you learn, and what would you ask next time?
Save your finished document and bring it — plus a short presentation — to the final lecture.
For your report and presentation — make sure you've captured this from Quest III:Access
- Summary of final findings in plain language — understandable even to a reader outside the project
- Presentation/communication of results — how the findings are shared
- Reflection on the process — what worked well and what you'd do differently
- Practical implications — who could use these findings and how
- Accessibility of the final report — clear and well-structured for someone without prior context
Present & Submit — put it to the test
Goal: present your findings and hand in your finished report. Design Thinking stage: Test.
- Presentations (~5–7 min each): problem → method → findings → recommendation
- Reflection — what was hardest, what you'd ask differently next time
Present, don't just read
Walk through your problem, your survey, what the data showed, and what you'd recommend — the chart is your best friend here.
Expect questions
This is the "Test" stage — other people poking at your reasoning is the point, not a problem. Their questions are like feedback on a prototype.
Reflect honestly
What would you have asked differently in your survey, now that you've seen the answers? That reflection is part of learning the method, not just the tools.
Submit your Word report — this closes out the workflow described in "The Mission" above.
Starting points for each tool
Official, free documentation for each step of the workflow — you won't need anything beyond these to complete the quests.
How the report will be marked
| Criterion | Weight |
|---|---|
| Survey design — clear, focused questions (Quest I) | 20% |
| Data analysis — correct formulas and a chart that fits the data (Quest II) | 30% |
| Report structure — heading styles, working table of contents, embedded chart (Quest III) | 30% |
| Overall clarity and quality of writing | 20% |
What you'll take away
By the end of this WebQuest, you won't just know how to use Forms, Excel, and Word — you'll have developed practical academic and digital skills that you can apply to university projects and future professional work.
You will learn how to:
- collect and organise data using digital tools
- create, clean, process, and analyse data
- interpret results and draw evidence-based conclusions
- design clear tables, charts, and data visualisations
- search for, evaluate, and appropriately reference reliable sources
- design and structure an academic or professional report
- present information clearly and logically
- combine data, evidence, and sources into a coherent project
- create a complete digital project from data collection to the final report.
The key skill is not simply knowing how to use a particular application. It is knowing how to move from a question, through data and reliable sources, to an organised analysis, a well-designed report, and a final project that other people can understand and trust.