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Statistics
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New Zealand
Level 3

Create and interpret column or bar graphs

Lesson
Practice
Lesson

Graphs are a visual way of presenting information. They can be really useful as they help us sort and order the information we collect and present it in a clear, concise way. Selecting a good type of graph to display your data is really important and the best type of graph to pick will change depending on the type of information you need to display. Let's run through a few different types of graphs now.

 

Bar graphs

Bar graph is a generic name for any graph that displays information using rectangular or cylindrical bars.

Example

Question 1

The sales (in thousands) of different products are shown in the following horizontal bar graph.

A horizontal bar graph has its vertical axis labeled with different product namely, Product A, Product B, Product C, Product D, Product E and Product F. The horizontal axis is marked from 0 to 10 and is labeled "Sales (thousands of units)." The length of the bar of Product A is 9. The length of the bar of Product B is 6. The length of the bar of Product C is 5. The length of the bar of Product D is 10. The length of the bar of Product E is 9. The length of the bar of Product F is 7.

  1. Which is the best-selling product?

    Product A

    A

    Product B

    B

    Product C

    C

    Product D

    D

    Product E

    E

    Product F

    F

  2. How many units of all products were sold in total?

  3. If product B was sold at $\$50$$50 each, find the revenue generated by product B alone.

 

Column graphs

A column graph is the name for a specific type of bar graph that uses vertical bars, so they appear like columns. Column graphs are used to show categories of data that you have counted. In a column graph, the height of the column shows the number of scores. Both the horizontal and vertical axes should be labelled to help explain the information in the graph. 

Example

Question 2

A survey of the preferred sport was done for a group of boys and the results are shown in the bar graph below:

Preferred sportSportNumber of boys510FootballTennisRugbyBasketballHockey
A vertical bar graph, titled "Preferred Sport," illustrates the number of boys' preferences for different sports. The horizontal axis lists five sports categories: Football, Tennis, Rugby, Basketball, and Hockey. The vertical axis, labeled "Number of Boys," scales from 0 to 10 in increments of 1. The bars show the bar height for "Football" at $6$6, "Tennis" at $8$8,"Rugby" at $7$7, "Basketball" at $7$7,and "Hockey" at $10$10. These heights of the bars are not explicitly labelled.

  1. How many boys prefer football to other sports?

  2. Which is the most popular sport?

    Football

    A

    Tennis

    B

    Rugby

    C

    Basketball

    D

    Hockey

    E

  3. How many boys took part in the survey?

QUESTION 3

John had $7$7 blue marbles, $4$4 black marbles, $8$8 yellow marbles, $13$13 white marbles, and $6$6 red marbles. Use this information to complete the column graph.

  1. MarblesColorNumber of Marbles51015blueblackyellowwhitered

 

 

 

Outcomes

S3-1

Conduct investigations using the statistical enquiry cycle: – gathering, sorting, and displaying multivariate category and wholenumber data and simple time-series data to answer questions;– identifying patterns and trends in context, within and between data sets; – communicating findings, using data displays

S3-2

Evaluate the effectiveness of different displays in representing the findings of a statistical investigation or probability activity undertaken by others.

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