Large Groups
This activity will help students understand the connection between real world data and its representation on a graph.
Additional Resource
1000 Play Thinks: Puzzles, Paradoxes, Illusions & Games, "Birthday Paradox from Ivan Muscovich" (Workman Publishing)
Understanding the connection between real world data and its representation on a graph is sometimes difficult for students to understand. Participation in this activity helps students to discover that connection. This is also a great activity to use near the beginning of the school year to help students get to know each other better.
4. Communicate mathematically.
Invitation to Learn
Read aloud Bart’s Amazing Charts by Dianne Ochiltree.
Instructional Procedures
Curriculum Integration
Social Studies—population graphs
Possible Extensions/Adaptations
Birthday Paradox—You want to have a party at which at least two
people share the same birthday (month and day). How many people do you have
to invite so that the probability of two people sharing the same birthday is
more that 0.5%? Remarkably, the probability of two people sharing a birthday
is about .5 in a group of just 23 people. To calculate this probability, you
have to look at the probability that every one has a different birthday.
For a group of two people, the probability is extremely high —364/365—
that they will have different birthdays. With a group of three, the probability
is not as high—363/365—and, since the group of three still contains
the group of two, the two probabilities are multiplied. Continue along this
track until the probability of everybody in the group having a different birthday
drops below.
Homework & Family Connections
Challenge students to find a graph in a magazine or newspaper. Then have them
explain what the graph represents to their families.
Have students choose a topic appropriate for investigation whose results can be displayed in a bar graph. Have students collect the data and complete the graph.