M&M® Challenge

by Lanette VonSeggerrn

Materials: Work sheet, clear plastic zip lock sandwich bag, and M&M's for everyone. Safety concern: Tell student they can eat them later ... Have students open their M&M's and pour them into the zip lock sandwich bag and lock them. They can count and sort them in the sandwich bag (work on fine motor skills).

Focus questions:

• Are there the same number of M&M®'s in each package?
• Are there the same number of different colors M&M's in a package?
• If, the numbers are different, what is the mean, median, and mode?
• Which of the three best describes the numbers ofM&M's in a typical package?

Ways to represent the data:

• Ordered list of colors by quantity
• Chart numbers for each color
• Box and whisker plots or stem and leaf plots for the data

Procedure:

• Without opening or touching your bag of M&M's, record your estimate of how many are inside.
• Predict how many of each color you will have. (If your estimated total is 10 M&M® Candies in your bag then your total prediction of M&M® Candies colors should also add to 10.)
• Open your M&M's and pour them into the zip lock sandwich bag and lock them.
• Find the actual total and how many of each color.
• Record your results below.
  

Create a chart for the different colors in your bag of M&M's. 

Create a chart for the totals in two bags of M&M's (yours & your partners). 

 Determine the percent of each color in your bag of M&M's.

Create a chart for the class’ bags of M&M's. 

 Determine the percent of each color in the class bags of M&M's.

Determine the class mean, median, and mode for each color.

Select a color.

Record the number of M&M's for that color each group had in their bag.

Make a Box and whisker plots or stem and leaf plots for that set of class data

Compare your results to the actual results from the web site.

Dr. Robert Sweetland's notes
[Home: thehob.net & homeofbob.com ]