Lesson | Loading...

2.2

Activity

10 mins

How Likely Is It?

Standards Alignment

Building On

Addressing

Building Toward

Instructional Routines

MLR8: Discussion Supports

Materials

To Gather

Number cubes

Activity Narrative

As preparation for talking about probability, students are asked to engage their intuition about the concept by loosely grouping scenarios into categories based on their likelihood. Some of the categories are meant to be loosely interpreted, while others such as “certain” and “impossible” have more precise meanings. Students should be able to construct arguments for their classification (MP3).

Launch

Arrange students in groups of 2.

Tell students that a “standard number cube” is a cube that has the numbers 1 through 6 printed on it so that each face shows a different number. This item will be referred to throughout the unit.

Describe a chance experiment as something that can be done for which the result is not known. The result of a chance experiment is called an outcome. For example, opening a 100-page book to a random page is a chance experiment because the page one opens to is not known. The outcome might be that it opened to page 42.

Define an event as a result of a chance experiment that someone is interested in. This could be one or more outcomes. For example, one might open a 100-page book to a random page and be interested in the event that they open to an even-numbered page.

It may help students to understand the categories of likelihood with an example of opening a book to a random page:

Impossible: opening a 100-page book to page -300
Unlikely: opening a 100-page book to page 45
Equally likely as not: opening a 100-page book to a page numbered less than 51
Likely: opening a 100-page book to a page numbered greater than 10
Certain: opening a 100-page book to a page numbered less than 1,000

Allow students 5–7 minutes quiet work time followed by partner and whole-class discussion.

MLR8 Discussion Supports. Invite students to begin partner interactions by repeating the question, “Is the event impossible, unlikely, equally likely as not, likely, or certain?” This gives both students an opportunity to produce language.
Advances: Conversing

Engagement: Provide Access by Recruiting Interest. Leverage choice around perceived challenge. Invite students to select 5–6 of the situations to complete.
Supports accessibility for: Organization, Social-Emotional Functioning

Activity

None

Student Task Statement

For each chance experiment, label the event with one of these options:
impossible, unlikely, equally likely as not, likely, certain.
1. A raffle prize is given to the person holding 1 ticket drawn from the 100 given out.
  Event: One of the 2 tickets you have is chosen.
2. You time how long you wait before someone takes your order at a fast-food restaurant.
  Event: It takes less than 10 minutes.
3. You roll a standard number cube.
  Event: You get an even number on top.
4. A random 4-year-old child is selected and their height is measured.
  Event: The chosen child is over 6 feet tall.
5. You write down the weather on July 1.
  Event: It snowed on that day.
6. You toss a ball into water.
  Event: The ball gets wet.
7. You spin the spinner here and find out which part the arrow points to.
  Event: It points to green.
8. You spin the spinner here and find out which part the arrow points to.
  Event: It points to red.
  
  A circular spinner divided into 3 parts. The top half of the spinner is divided into two equal parts, a yellow section, labeled “Y” and a blue section, labeled “B.” The bottom half of the spinner is one green section labeled “G.” The spinner dial points to the section labeled "G."
Discuss your answers to the previous question with your partner. If you disagree, work to reach an agreement.
For each of the 5 labels, write a combination of chance experiment and event that fits the likelihood.

Lesson | Loading...

Settings

Audience

Assessment Access

Lesson 2

Chance Experiments

Warm-up

Which Is More Likely?

Instructional Routines

Materials

Activity Narrative

Launch

Activity

Student Task Statement

Student Response

Building on Student Thinking

Are You Ready for More?

Activity Synthesis

Activity

How Likely Is It?

Standards Alignment

Building On

Addressing

7.SP.C.5

Building Toward

Instructional Routines

Materials

To Gather

Activity Narrative

Launch

Activity

Student Task Statement

Student Response

Building on Student Thinking

Are You Ready for More?