Lesson 1: Charting the Declining Troops

Minard’s Map is a powerful tool with lots of information regarding Napoleon’s French Invasion of Russia of 1812. Can you use the number of troops information along with the dates to graph the number of casualties on each part of the journey?

Doing the science

1. Start the Data Visualization Simulation by clicking on the "Sim" tab.
2. Click on the "Date" button at the bottom of the screen.
3. Move the mouse over each section of the path to view the dates of the French Invasion of Russia.
4. Copy Graph 1 on a piece of graph paper and write the dates of the main path on it.
5. Click on the "Troops" button at the bottom of the screen.
6. Move the mouse over each section of the path to view the size of Napoleon’s army.
7. Plot the troop size on the map in regard to the dates. The first two have been done for you.
8. Connect all the dots to create a line graph.

Do You Understand?

1. Were there any instances where Napoleon’s army increased in soldier count?



2. What time period had the greatest number of casualties?