Emphasis in teaching and learning statistics has shifted from memorizing formulas and procedures to investigating situations, creating models, and using data to understand problems. The Common Core State Standards for Mathematics (CCSSM) (NGA Center and CCSSO 2010) Grade 8 Statistics and Probability content standards drive this point home. Students are to "interpret" scatterplots, "investigate" patterns, and "describe" relationships. In short, learning to do statistics is fundamentally about learning to think and communicate statistically. To engage middle school students in the processes and practices of statistics, the authors taught a multiday lesson based on the Footprint problem (Koellner-Clark and Lesh 2003; Imm and Lorber 2010) where students were presented with a mystery for which the only clue was a single footprint. Students had opportunities to "reason abstractly and quantitatively" as they used statistical tools to investigate the situation. For their final report, students used a teacher-created template to write a formal letter to the school district sharing their statistical findings and recommendations.