Day 135 Central Tendency Quiz

6th Grade Math Standards: 6.SP.2 Understand that a set of data collected to answer a statistical question has a distribution which can be described by its center, spread, and overall shape.
6.SP.3. Recognize that a measure of center for a numerical data set summarizes all of its values with a single number, while a measure of variation describes how its values vary with a single number.

Quote of the Day: “The starter gun fired and the race began. Almost as soon as it started, a boy tripped and fell, did a couple of somersaults, and started to cry. The eight other runners saw the boy fall and they all slowed down and looked behind them. They stopped and went back to where the boy was lying and crying. A girl with Down syndrome sat down next to him, hugged him, and asked, ‘Are you feeling better now?’ Then all nine held hands and skipped to the finish line. The whole crowd stood and applauded.” – Joe Ehrmann

Question from Yesterday (as always from a student): "Since we're finding a missing value in the data set and that missing value is 10, is the mode now 10 and 15?"

The Learning Objective: Find the mean, median, and mode of a data set; manipulate the mean when adding a new value to the data set

Assessment: Quiz on Central Tendency

Agenda:

1. Assembly (Spread the word to end the word)
2. QSSQ
3. Take the quiz
4. Work on the weekly quiz 

Glass Half-Full: In the morning I was peppering students at their lockers with a question regarding central tendency. Too many did not know what it was. Obviously the students had not studied over the weekend. So, why is this in half-full? Eventually the students knew the definition well enough to put it down on the quiz.

Regrets: The question that had the students bring their average from an 89 after eight quizzes to a 90 after taking a 9th quiz was baffling for the students. The co-teacher suggested I start with smaller numbers and fewer data values next year and get students to master it. To some degree I feel like I did that with finding the mean of 6, but I did not have the students change the mean from 6 to 7.

Link of the Day: Middle school students have an attention span of 10 - 12 minutes on average according to this article. It also alludes to the idea that the brain growth during adolescence is greater than any other time in life. I like the idea of creating five short lessons rather than one long lesson.