Category Archives: Probability

Virtual Filing Cabinet 1.0

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I trawled, I tweeted, I tried to find the best of what was out there. I have posted the first draft of my virtual filing cabinet here and in the process, learned the following:

  • There are so so many great lessons and activities out there!
  • There are far too many to include them all
  • It is hard to choose which ones to include
  • There are some incredible teachers who I would like to be more like
  • I’m really excited about trying just a handful of things I found
  • I want to do a lot more project based lessons
  • This is a working document and will evolve with my teaching

If you haven’t already I highly recommend you trawl some websites and create one of these yourself. Chances are, it will be unique to you and your teaching style and philosophy. Here is a list of websites to get you started. 

Let me know if you think there are any glaring emissions.

Combinations and The Lottery

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This Nrich Lottery Simulator was a great way to introduce Combinations and Permutations to my Stats class. We started with students choosing 1 number out of a possible 4 to see who could win (and several did). I then allowed them to choose from 5 numbers. Fewer students won. Then I asked them to pick 2 numbers between 1 and 5. Even fewer won.

Then, following the British National Lottery, they had to choose 5 numbers between 1 and 49. A couple got 2 numbers correct at most. This led nicely into a conversation about how many combinations are possible, whether order matters and how we can work these things out. They were also hooked for the whole time.

This also helped to convince them that their chances of winning anything on the lottery were very slim. I think this will also lead very nicely into talking about expected value.