Page 66 - Mathematics Coursebook

6.1 Planning to collect data

2 Where would you get data to help you answer the following questions?
a How many loaves of bread does your local shop sell every day?
b How many cars are sold in the world every year?
c Which country has the highest mountain in the world?
d How many students cycle to your school?
e How many people live in your village or town?
3 Would you collect primary data or secondary data to answer
the following questions?
a What is the favourite football team of the students in
your class?
b Which football team has the biggest stadium in the world?
c Which sport is played by the most students in your school?
d How often do the members of your family eat fruit?
e How many people live in your country?

4 When you collect primary data you can either
i carry out a survey and ask people questions or
ii carry out an experiment and write down your results.
For each of the following questions, decide whether you should carry out a survey or an experiment.
Write i or ii for each answer. The first one is done for you.

a How many times does a dice land on ‘1’ when it is rolled 50 times? Answer: ii
b What is the favourite song of students in your class?
c How many brothers and sisters do students in your class have?

d How many times does a coin land on ‘heads’ when it is flipped 20 times?
e What is the most common shoe size of the students in your school?
f What is the most common total score when you roll two dice?
g How often do the members of your class visit the doctor?
5 Odita wants to know if the students in her school like to play cricket.

I am only going to ask the boys.

Will the results of her survey give a fair result?
Give a reason for your answer.
6 Taji wants to know when people prefer to do their shopping. He stands outside the supermarket
on a Saturday and asks people as they come out of the shop.
Will the results of his survey give a fair result? Give a reason for your answer.
7 Taya wants to find out people’s favourite sports. Every evening for one week she stands outside

the swimming pool and asks people as they go in.
Will the results of her survey give a fair result? Give a reason for your answer.

6 Planning and collecting data 65