LESSON PLANNING

Lesson planning
This template can be used for individual lessons or a sequence of lessons in the
same topic.
Teacher’s initials: School:

Subject/age group: Date:

Learning objectives (from the Cambridge Primary Mathematics curriculum framework):

 6Ss.03 Understand that the mode, median, mean and range are ways to describe and summarise data sets. Find and
interpret the mode (including bimodal data), median, mean and range, and consider their appropriateness for the
context.

Topic: Learning intentions: Success criteria:

10.1 Mode, median, mean and range
Understand that the mode, median,
mean and range are ways to describe
and summarise data sets. Find and
interpret the mode (including bimodal
data), median, mean and range, and
consider their appropriateness for the
context.
Learners will be able to calculate the
mode, median, mean and range of a
set of data. They will understand what
each of these measures tell us about
the data.
Learners will be able to choose the
measures that are most appropriate
for the context of a problem.

Mental strategies:
Give learners sets of number according to the mental methods that they need to practise, this can include numbers with
decimals or fractions. Ask learners to quickly calculate the mean and the range of the set of numbers. Ask learners to share
strategies for particular sets of numbers that help them to work quickly and accurately.

1 Resources:
 Resource Sheet 10A, Resources Sheet 10B, number cards, large space

2 Language support, including any key vocabulary:

 Average A measure used to find the middle or most typical value in a set of data.
 Mode The value that occurs most often in a set of data
 Bimodal A set of data that has two modes.
 Median The middle value in an ordered set of data.
 Mean The average of a set of data, calculated by adding up all the values and dividing by the number
of values.
 Range The difference between the lowest and highest values in a set of data.

3 Introducing the lesson: Timing:

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 Cut out the pieces of the Resource Sheet 10A along only the dotted lines. 20 minutes
Display the pieces around the classroom area. Each piece is a clue along the
trail. Put learners into pairs. Give each pair a letter on the trail as their
starting position. Tell learners to write down the letters of each clue they
arrive at. Learners should solve the problem on the lower section of their
clue. They then look around the classroom to find the answer on the top
part of a different clue. Learners write down the new letter on the clue with
their answer and solve the problem and the bottom of their new clue.
Learners continue following the trail by solving the clues until they return
to the clue they started on.
 Alternatively sets of the cards can be places on tables for small groups to
work together on in the same way.

 The solution is A, D, X, Q, N, G, B, R, K, E, L, U, P, M, S, O, V, J, H, C, I, T, W,
F and back to A.

4 Main activities Timing:

 Tell learners that we have different ways of measuring data sets (the mode, 40 minutes
median, and mean averages and the range) because each is useful in
different contexts and each measure can give us different information
about a set of data.
 Give the Resource Sheet 10B Using Averages and Range to small groups of
learners. Ask them to cut along the lines to make eight cards. The learners
should discuss whether they think that the answers to the questions on the
cards are ‘mode’, ‘median’, ‘mean’ or ‘range’, and group them
appropriately. Compare how the groups of learners have grouped the cards
and discuss any difference of opinion.
 For cards C and H ask the learners to work out the three different averages
for the sets of data. Ask the learners to say which they think best describes
the data. Both sets have no mode, so the mode does not give us very much
information about the data. For both sets the mean is a value that does not
represent most of the data, it is either too high (card C) or too low (card H)
because there is one value that is very different to all the other and this is
affects the mean, but not the median. Tell learners that the mean is good at
describing the data when there is a large number of values, such as on card
F, or when there is not one or two values that are very different to the rest.
 Tell learners that it is important that they think about what information
each of the measures gives us about the data so that they can draw
conclusions.
 Tell learner’s to complete question 6, 7 and 8 and the Let’s Investigate
section of Exercise 10.1 in the Learner’s Book. Share learner’s good
examples of using the data to explain and convince in questions 6 and 8.

5 Assessment opportunities:
 Look at how learners have used data to explain and convince in questions 6 and 8 of the Learner’s Book to
assess their understanding of how to choose the measures that are most appropriate for the context of a
problem.

6 Differentiation opportunities:

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 Support less confident learners by providing them with instructions for calculating each of the different
averages and the range.
 Challenge more confident learners by asking them to facilitate the discussion with the cards in a group.

7 Plenary and reflection: Timing:

 Give each learner a number card. In a large space ask learners to quickly try 15 minutes
to put themselves into sets that match a description. For example
 Get into a group where:
 The range of your numbers is 3.
 The median of your numbers is 4.5.
 The mode of your numbers is 6.
 The mean of your numbers is 7.
 Repeat with different number values. Ask learners How did you know you
could join that group? Could someone-else join that group so that it would
still match the description? Why?
 For some of the descriptions not all learners will be able to join a group. Ask
learners Why is it not possible for this number to join any of the sets? What
would happen to the range/median/mode/mean of your set if this number
joined?

8 Homework (if required):

 Ask learners to measure the heights of people in their household and work out the mode, median, mean
and range of the heights. They should write sentences describe what they have found out.

Notes:

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