What are statistics?
Statistics are numbers that describe a set of data.
What is a set of data?
A set of data is any set of numbers that describe something. They can be
grades on school tests, temperatures in Seattle throughout the year or
numbers that come up on dice that you throw.
What are some statistics?
Well, let's say we rolled 2 dice 11 times and we wrote down their totals.
Here they are:
6 4 10 8 8 7 2 3 9 8 12
The maximum is the largest number: 12
The minimum is the smallest number: 2
The range of a set of data is the maximum(highest) minus the
minimum (lowest) number.
In our example, the range is:
12 - 2 = 10.
The mean is the average of all the numbers. The average of the 11
numbers in our set is:
6 + 4 + 10 + 8 + 8 + 7 + 2 + 3 + 9 + 8 + 12 77
--------------------------------------------- = -- = 7
11 11
The mode is the most common number in the set. It is the one that
occurs most often. In our set, the mode is 8 because there are 3 of them
and only one each of the other numbers.
The median is the number in the middle. You can find the middle
number by crossing out the lowest number, then the highest, then the
next lowest, then the next highest and so on until you have only one
number left. That last number is the median.
In our case, you do the crossing out and find the median:
6 4 10 8 8 7 2 3 9 8 12
The median number is ____.