Can a family really have 1.7 children? This was the question that came up today when students were exploring measures of central tendency. They were so convinced that the only possible appropriate answer for the average number of children in a family could be 2 because you can't have a part of a child.
So I threw this their way...suppose we have two communities that are planning for how many schools they will need to build for the children. Each school has a maximum capacity of 1000 students.
Community One: 800 families
Community Two: One million families
What happens in each situation if the community planners use the value of "2" for number of children instead of the number "1.7"?
Great discussion followed...they were really surprised that ".3" of a child could make such a difference. 300 completely empty schools due to poor planning!
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