Median, Mean, Mode, and Range and Graphs

This week my students began studying the median, mean, mode, and range of a set of data. To make data collecting a little more interesting the students developed a survey using surveymonkey.com. The questions ranged from favorite singers to favorite sports. We recruited the computer teachers help in gathering the answers. She had one class from each grade level take the survey. The next day the students logged in to get the results. They took those results and created a bar graph using the nces create-a-graph site. We used the data and the graph to explore the median, mean, mode, and range. I wanted the students to also learn how to find these using excel. To do this they made different charts in excel and found the median, mode, mean, and range using the function buttons. After that, just for practice, they used the chart to insert a bar graph into excel. Through this activity the students not only explored the median, mean, mode, and range of a set of data but they also gained experience with online survey development and Mircrosoft Excel. I have included some student samples at the bottom of the blog.