Name: ______________________________ Date: _____________________

STATISTICAL QUESTIONS
N-GEN MATH® 6

Statistics is a branch of study in both math and science that seeks to answer questions where
variability affects the answer.
WHAT IS VARIABILITY?
Variability is just the fact that when we measure a quality of a group, say height, color, speed,
weight, income, etcetera, the measurement is not always the same for the different subjects.

Exercise #1: In each scenario described below, circle the one in which variability is present.

(a) Jenna bought $4.50 worth of candy at the Jenna has four friends who each spend
movies. money on candy at the movies.

(b) Max ran the 100-yard dash in 16 second. Eight people ran the 100-yard dash.

(c) Nora’s friends send various amounts of Nora sends 18 texts this week.
texts this week.

People use statistics to answer questions that they know involve variability. It is important to be
able to tell what is and what isn’t a statistical question.

Exercise #2: The Boston Marathon is a huge race that often has around 30 thousand runners each
year. In 2018, Desiree Linden won the women’s portion of the race.
(a) Given the question: “How long did it take (b) Given the question: “How long did it take
for Desiree Linden to run the Boston for runners to complete the 2018 Boston
Marathon?” explain why this is not a Marathon?” explain why this is a
statistical question. statistical question.

(c) Given the question: “How long did it take the female winners of the Boston Marathon to
finish the race since they first ran in 1966?” Is this a statistical question? Explain.

® ®
N-GEN MATH® 6, UNIT 11 – STATISTICS - LESSON 1
eMATHinstruction, RED HOOK, NY 12571, © 2020
Let’s begin to analyze some of the variation that arises in a statistical question.

Exercise #3: Yasmin teaches sixth grade math to 25 students. She would like to answer the
question “How many pets do students in my math class have?” She asks each student to record
how many pets they have and collects the following data:

1, 3, 4, 3, 2, 5, 3, 2, 1, 0, 3, 4, 6, 9, 3, 5, 2, 0, 2, 1, 3, 6, 4, 3, 2
(a) Explain why this is a statistical question.
# of Pets Tally Marks Total
0
1
2
3
(b) Summarize the data in the table to the
4
right.
5
6
(c) Which category (number of pets) occurs
the most often? This is known as the 7
mode of a data set. 8
9

(d) Create a dot plot of the data from your table on the number line below.

(e) Do more students have less than the mode number of pets or more than the mode number of
pets? Justify your answer.

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N-GEN MATH® 6, UNIT 11 – STATISTICS - LESSON 1
eMATHinstruction, RED HOOK, NY 12571, © 2020
Name: ______________________________ Date: _____________________
STATISTICAL QUESTIONS
N-GEN MATH® 6 HOMEWORK

FLUENCY

1. For each of the following scenarios, circle the one that involves variability.

(a) Davis earned $10 in allowance this week. Davis has six friends who each earn
allowance.

(b) Each student in a class records how many Lucas watched 5 hours of television this
hours of television they watched this weekend
weekend.

(c) A group of 100 people were asked how Janelle read 12 books this year.
many books they read this year.

(d) The pizza store Cheezy Peezy sold 225 The pizza store Cheezy Peezy keeps track
pizzas this week. of how many pizzas they sold each week
for 52 weeks.

2. For each of the following questions, state YES if it is a statistical question (i.e. one that
accounts for variability in its answer). State NO if it is not a statistical question.
(a) Coach Hoyt has 15 players on his (b) Laura has been training to run in a 3-
basketball team. He asks “How many mile race this weekend. She asks “How
pushups can my basketball players do?” long will it take me to run 3 miles?”

(c) Lily has a collection of old coins that (d) Kirk scored a 78% on his most recent
come from many different years. She math test. He asks “How did I do
asks “How old is my oldest coin?” compared to other students in the class?”

® ®
N-GEN MATH® 6, UNIT 11 – STATISTICS - LESSON 1
eMATHinstruction, RED HOOK, NY 12571, © 2020
3. Eggs come in a variety of sizes: small, medium, large, extra-large, and jumbo. Khloe is trying
to answer the following question:
How much do extra-large eggs weigh?
To answer this question, she weighs 25 extra-large eggs. Their weights are below in grams.

64, 68, 67, 64, 65, 63, 68, 64, 70, 62, 65, 62, 64, 66, 64, 63, 64, 66, 63, 64, 62, 63, 65, 63

(a) Explain why Khloe’s question is a (b) Create a dot plot of the data below.
statistical question?

(c) Which weight represents the mode of (d) What percent of the data values are
this data set? Why? equal to the mode from (c)?

(1) 8% (3) 32%

(2) 28% (4) 40%

(e) The government states that extra-large eggs must have weights that are a minimum of 63
grams and a maximum of 69 grams. How many of the 25 eggs should not be classified as
extra-large?

® ®
N-GEN MATH® 6, UNIT 11 – STATISTICS - LESSON 1
eMATHinstruction, RED HOOK, NY 12571, © 2020