Peer Review

Compare European countries

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Effectiveness:

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Overview:: Research tool using data from Eurostat to find comparative indicators for: food prices, per capita earnings, healthy life expectancy for females, stolen vehicles, and hotel prices. Educators and students can explore country rankings and trends over time. They can create and download charts for presentations and research projects.This tool is restricted to the nations of Europe.
Type of Material:: Reference Material.
Recommended Uses:: Aside from this tool being demonstrated in the classroom, this would be a resource tool to be used individually and independently by students. The best use of this website would be using the comparisons in a lesson on European levels of development.
Technical Requirements:: High Speed Internet and use of Web Browser.
Identify Major Learning Goals:: 1. Use a tool that can call up demographic data for specific countries. 2. Comparison of data across countries which can be linked to other reports which explain the differences in cultures and how they affect the economic data above. 3. Compile the above into graphics that can be used in other reports.
Target Student Population:: High school and college students interested in some quick facts about European countries.
Prerequisite Knowledge or Skills:: It would be helpful for students to understand how to use comparative data and to read graphs. This should be used in conjunction with other demographic data for reports which may help to explain these findings.

Rating:
Strengths:: The material available is interesting. It provides some basic material for comparing markedly different places. Unfortunately, it seems unfinished. Much of the functionality seems disabled.
Concerns:: The comparison subjects are very limited, there are only five. Many of the countries listed under the "Countries" button are not included in the comparisons. The stolen vehicle link opens to a blank page, only by trying different years does it eventually work. The data do not go beyond 2012. It is dated and needs to be more contemporary. Key parts of the program are not working. This site needs to be revisited by its creator.

Rating:
Strengths:: For a quick comparison of European countries, and with the instructor providing some guidance, this site could be useful.
Concerns:: The tool makes no attempt to be a learning device. It does not give specific directions as to how to use it. It gives no examples of what might be found. There are no tips on how to compile the data so it is most meaningful. There is no feedback mechanism that encourages the students and gives clear conceptualization as to how results might fit into proper research methods.

Rating:
Strengths:: It essentially consists of five active buttons. The learning curve is minimal.
Concerns:: The product of the data mining would be graphs that can be saved, printed, or embedded (using a URL). There does not appear to be any adjustment of the images to fit the purpose of use. As noted above, the program is not working properly and there is no invitation as to who to contact to report the need to update.

Other Issues and Comments:: This material would be useful in a very limited context. If an instructor has a lesson requiring a comparison of European countries by average food prices, then this would be useful. Otherwise, it would be better to use the source data from Eurostat. It has not been updated since at least 2012.
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