Analyzing Country Data

Activity Overview

This activity involves sample listings of the ages of 200 people from each of three countries: USA, Kenya and Japan.

Students will:

• Consider why a summary of ages is important and how a summary of the ages can be connected to a better understanding of the populations of each country.
• Examine sample ages from the three countries displayed in a spreadsheet and in histograms with percent on the vertical scale that highlight the distinctive features of the distribution of the ages from each sample.
• Connect descriptions of the histograms to summaries based on box plots.
• Learn that samples are not exact pictures of the population but sample statistics can provide a reasonable way to develop estimates of the total populations of each country.
• As an extension, students create a sample of their “own” country and put together a summary of the country based on the sample.