OwlSheets
Water Quality Lab: Choose the Right Summary worksheet preview

WorksheetPremium

Water Quality Lab: Choose the Right Summary

Students use community water-quality data to justify when mean and MAD or median and IQR are useful summaries.

Grade 6MathInteractive · Printable

Aligned to6.SP.B.5.d

Buy this worksheet: $1.50

Or unlock every Premium worksheet with Premium

PrintUnlock to print
Answer keyUnlock to see answers
Assign to classUnlock to assign with a class code

What’s included

  • Single worksheet
  • Auto-graded online
  • 1 Common Core standard
  • Printable answer key
  • 13 questions
  • Classroom-ready

Details

Format
Interactive · Printable
Grade
Grade 6
Subject
Math
Question types
Fill in the blank, Multiple choice, Sorting, Short answer

About this worksheet

What students practice

  • Students choose measures of center and variation based on symmetry, skew, and extreme values.
  • Students explain how the purpose of a water-quality report affects the choice of statistical summaries.

How to use

Use after teaching mean, median, MAD, and IQR. Have students identify the shape and reporting purpose before choosing summaries, then discuss the final explanation.

Curriculum

Common Core standard covered

6.SP.B.5.d

Explain why a measure of center and variation fits a data set, based on its shape and context.

Preview

OwlSheets.com

Name Date

Water Quality Lab: Choose the Right Summary

Use data shape and purpose to choose measures of center and variation.

1. Summarizing Steady Readings

A community science lab tests local water. Turbidity measures cloudiness in NTU; larger readings mean cloudier water. Use shape and context, not just calculation, to choose summaries.

The mean absolute deviation (MAD) describes the average distance from the mean. The interquartile range (IQR) describes the spread of the middle half of the data. Mean and MAD are often useful for roughly symmetric data without extreme values. Median and IQR are often useful for skewed data or data with extreme values.
1.
The lab takes 25 turbidity readings at a creek station. Which description best matches the display?012345678910468101214Turbidity (NTU)Readings
  • A. The data have a long tail toward lower readings.
  • B. The data are roughly symmetric with one central peak.
  • C. The data form two clusters with an empty interval between.
  • D. The data have a long tail toward higher readings.
2.
For the creek readings in Question 1, the lab wants a center and a measure of variation that use every reading. Which recommendation fits?
  • A. Use median and range because all readings are nearly identical.
  • B. Use median and IQR because the shape has a long upper tail.
  • C. Use mean and MAD because the shape is roughly symmetric.
  • D. Use mean and range because range describes the average distance.

The preview shows the first questions. Unlock the worksheet to see all of it.

Related worksheets