Learning Objective: Students will be able to create, read, and interpret box and

whisker plots and their data. They will use Shodor to create these graphs.
Opening:
How many of you go Black Friday shopping? Now for those of you that go, what
number are you just one out of that go shopping on the night of and day after
Thanksgiving? 1 million? 1 billion? How much do you spend? $50 or $500? What do
you think the average person spends? Lets take a look at some data from 2005
through 2013.
Data Set (ascending in years in millions): 132, 140, 147, 172, 195, 212, 226, 247,
249
It just so happens that not only are the years in ascending order, but it turns out that
the amount of shoppers increases as well as we go from year to year. Lets put this
information into a box and whisker plot using Shodor Box Plot interactive activity, but
before we do, what do you all think the graph might look like? Will the box be small
with long whiskers? Will the box be long with short whiskers? What does this plot tell
us about the data?
Also, I talked about how the data is in ascending order, why is that important in order
to graph a box and whisker plot?

Plot the data together as a class and look at and analyze the box and whisker plot.
Activity/Lesson:
Have the students stay on Shodor. We will spend a couple minutes exploring the
different aspects of the program in reference to our data set applied during the
opening. Have them click on Set Horizontal Scale. Explain that this is where you
can change what integers your number line will start and stop at. In this case, it
wouldnt make sense to go from 1-10. Set the number line logically. Next have them
click on Show Statistics. This will show the number of data points, minimum,
maximum, median, Q1 and Q3.
During our observation of the statistics listed, explain to the students how to find the
median, Q1 and Q3.
If there is an even number of data points, the median will be the average of
the two numbers competing to be in the middle when in numerical order

from least to greatest. To find Q1 and Q3, break the data set (which is still in
numerical order) in half. Q1 will then be the average of the two numbers
competing to be in the middle of the front half of data points and Q3 will be
the average of the two numbers competing to be in the middle of the back
half of data points.
If there is an odd number of data points, the median is the middle number of
the numerically aligned data points. To find Q1 and Q3, ignore the median
and find the median of the points remaining on the left and right separately by
averaging the two numbers in the middle of each sublist.

Also note to the students that where you enter the data points you must include
,state after each data point. When you change the data points, you must click
Update Box Plot in order to update the Box and Whisker Plot.
One other important thing to know about is known as an outlier. An outlier is a data
point that stands far away from the others. To know if any data points are outliers,
find the interquartile range by taking (Q3-Q1)*(1.5) + Q3. If any data points are
higher than this, then they are outliers.
Lets look at another set of data from 2005-2013s shopping extravaganzas, which is
the average spent by shoppers on Black Friday.
Data Set(2005-2013 respectively): 301.81, 360.15, 347.55, 372.57, 343.31, 365.34,
398.62, 423.66, 413.02
I want you each to first form a hypothesis of what you think the graph will look like
and what it will tell you. Then, once youve made some assumptions, go ahead and
enter the data to see what kind of a graph is produced. Does it look how you thought
it would? What can we conclude from this graph?

Summary:
Box and whisker plots provide a visual way of understanding both the range (the
difference between the smallest and largest data points) and the middle of a data
set. A box-and-whisker plot essentially divides the data set into four sections known
as quartiles. These include whisker, box, box, whisker, respectively. The size of the
quartiles may be different, but the number of data points in each quartile is the same.
Box and whisker plots help show how data is distributed and can also be used to

compare two data sets to each other. However, it does not show distribution in as
much detail as a histogram, but it is useful in showing whether a distribution is
skewed or if there are outliers in the data set.
Think of the center of a data set as a single, or typical, number that can be used to
stand in for the whole data set. We usually use mean or median for the center. I
found that the median tends to be a better "typical" value if the distribution is skewed.
The center then stands in for the whole data set even though the values, obviously,
do not all lie at the center. When we think about how far away a value is from the
center, we are thinking of the spread. We typically use interquartile range, the
median, or mean absolute deviation. However, in this lesson we stick with looking at
the interquartile range along with the median.
This Measure of Center website is an excellent source that talks about measures of
center and gives examples that I want to share with my class for extra help and
practice.
Give students the quiz titled Box and Whisker Plot Quiz at the end of class allowing
them five minutes to complete it. It is available on Schoology using access code
KWNN7-8QHD8 and on Socrative using room number 8a8321a0.
Quiz Questions:
In order to construct a box and whisker plot you have to have the data points in
numerical order.
True/False - 1 point
Which of the following do you NOT need in order to make a box and whisker plot?
median, highest value, mean, lowest value - 1 point
To find out if there are any outliers in the data set you have to find the ____.
Interquartile range - 1 point
Use paper and pencil to calculate if there are any outliers in the following data set.
2, 9, 7, 13, 27, 56, 15, 22
If there are outliers, how many and what are they? If there are not simply reply with
N/A.
Yes, there is one outlier and it is 56. - 3 points
A box and whisker plot is broken up in ____ parts which are called ____.
four; quartiles
Both whiskers contain the same amount of data points and both parts of the box
contain the same amount of data point, but all four do not have the same amount as
each other.
True/False - 1 point

What can we use to find the measure of center for box and whisker plots?
mean or median, mean or range, range or mode, or mode or median - 1 point
How far a data point is from the center is known as the what?
mode, spread, distance, or interquartile range - 1 point