Big Ideas Math: Modeling Real Life, Grade 8
BI
Big Ideas Math: Modeling Real Life, Grade 8 View details
4. Choosing a Data Display
Continue to next subchapter

Exercise 4 Page 257

A circle graph is a type of data display that shows data as parts of a whole.

Not appropriate, see solution.

Practice makes perfect

Through the use of a circle graph, we want to show the change of the number of hits for our school's new website based on the given table during these 5 months.

Month Hits
August 250
September 320
October 485
November 650
December 925

Let's recall what a circle graph displays. They show data as parts of a whole. This means that, to create a circle graph, we need to divide the number of hits for each month by the overall number of hits. The overall number of hits is the sum of each month.

Month Hits Percentage
August 250 250/2630*100 %≈ 9.5 %
September 320 320/2630*100 %≈ 12.2 %
October 485 485/2630*100 %≈ 18.4 %
November 650 650/2630*100 %≈ 24.7 %
December 925 925/2630*100 %≈ 35.2 %
Sum 2630 100 %

Now we can plot the circle graph using these percentages.

pie chart
The circle graph does not show the exact number of hits each month and it is difficult to track how this number changes over time. Therefore, this data display is not appropriate for this situation. It was a nice try, though.

Extra

Types of Data Displays

Let's recall the types of data displays we can use to describe a data set.

Data Display When Do We Use It?
Pictograph To show data using pictures
Dot Plot To show the number of times each value occurs in a data set
Stem-and-Leaf Plot To show how ordered numerical data are distributed
Box-and-Whisker Plot To show the variability of a data set by using quartiles
Circle Graph To show data as parts of a whole
Bar Graph To show frequencies of data values in specific categories
Histogram To show frequencies of data values in intervals of the same size
Line Graph To show how data change over time
Scatter Plot To show the relationship between two data sets using ordered pairs plotted in a coordinate plane