Reading bar graphs and a class project

1The librarian's graph

2How to read a bar

Put your finger on the top of the bar. Slide it straight across to the scale and read the number. Here each line stands for 2 books.

• Monday's bar reaches the 12 line: 12 books.
• Thursday's bar stops halfway between 6 and 8. Halfway between 6 and 8 is 7, so 7 books.

3Answering questions

• Most books? The tallest bar: Wednesday, 14 books.
• Fewest books? The shortest bar: Thursday, 7 books.
• How many more on Monday than on Tuesday? 12 − 8 = 4.
• How many in the whole week? 12 + 8 + 14 + 7 + 10 = 51.

4Your class project

Now be a data detective! Work in a group:

1. Choose a question, for example: "How do pupils in our class travel to school?" or "Which game do we like best at break?"
2. Collect the data: ask everyone and use tally marks.
3. Organise it in a frequency table with a total.
4. Draw a bar graph with a title, axes, labels and a scale.
5. Talk about it: write three sentences about what your graph shows, for example which group is the biggest and how many more it has than the smallest.

Try it yourself

Work each one in your exercise book first. Then tap Show answer to check.