Understanding the mean

The topic  appears under the 6th Grade Math Mission. This exercise has several interactions that are intended to better understand what the mean, really means!

Types of Problems
There are three types of problems in this exercise:


 * 1) Select which of the statements are true: This problem provides the mean of a group and several statements that attempt to interpret the mean. The student is asked to select the statements that are true from a multiple select list.Utm1.png
 * 2) Find the mean: This problem provides a list of data collected from a situation. The student is asked to calculate the mean and write it in the space provided.Utm2.png
 * 3) Determine how a value effects the mean: This problem provides the mean and all but one of the data value from the set of values. The student is asked to use the given information to determine something about the missing value.Utm3.png

Strategies
Knowledge of how to calculate the average (arithmetic mean) of a set of numbers would help with performing this exercise.
 * 1) The formula for the mean is the sum all the data values, then divide by number of data values, that is, $$ \frac{\Sigma x_i}{n} $$.
 * 2) Research indicates that one of the statements are true from the multiple select list, but this could change in the future.
 * 3) To perform the Determine how a value effects the mean problem calculate the mean of the information provided. If it is too low, the missing value is higher than the mean. If it is too high, the missing value is lower than the mean.