Unit 8, Lesson 2
Chance Experiments
Grade 7
Preparation
Lesson Narrative
In this lesson students investigate chance experiments. A chance experiment is something that can be repeated with results that are based on chance. The result of a chance experiment is called an outcome. They use language like “impossible,” “unlikely,” “equally likely as not,” “likely,” and “certain” to describe the likelihood of a chance event. An event is a set of one or more outcomes in a chance experiment. Students make sense of situations and sort them into these categories based on their intuition about how often they expect an event to occur (MP3). In some cases, a value is assigned to the likelihood of an event using a fraction, decimal, or percentage chance. By comparing informal categories early and numerical quantities later, students are attending to precision (MP6) when sorting the scenarios. Later, students will connect this language to more precise numerical values on their own.
- Comprehend and use the terms “impossible,” “unlikely,” “equally likely as not,” “likely,” and “certain” (in spoken and written language) to describe the likelihood of an event.
- Interpret percentages, fractions, and decimals that represent the likelihood of events.
- Order a given set of events from least likely to most likely, and justify (orally) the reasoning.
Let’s investigate chance.
Required Preparation
None
A chance experiment is something that can be done over and over again, and what will happen each time is not known.
For example, each time the spinner is spun, it could land on red, yellow, blue, or green.
An event is a set of 1 or more outcomes in a chance experiment.
For example, if a number cube is rolled, there are 6 possible outcomes.
Some events are “rolling a number less than 3,” “rolling an even number,” or “rolling a 5.”
An outcome of a chance experiment is one of the things that can happen.
For example, the possible outcomes of tossing a coin are heads and tails.