Thursday, April 30, 2015

Mean Absolute Deviation

This post will cover the topic of Mean Absolute Deviation, also known as MAD.  MAD tells if all data points are evenly distributed.  A small MAD average means the data clusters close to the mean of the values.  A large MAD average means the data is more spread out from the mean of the values.


              

Notice that the Mean, Median, and Range are the same number for all the Histograms.

The way this is calculated is by finding the mean of a set of data.  Then to find the median, followed by the range.  With this information, the next step is to set up a table similar to the one.  Make sure it contains these titles for the columns: X values, the mean of the set, the X value - the mean of the set, and the absolute value of the X value - the mean of the set.  Then have the total average at the bottom.
                                                       
 (Here is a fun activity for your students to play that goes off of what I have explained about statistics using Mean Absolute Deviation.) Activities to practice MAD.

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3 comments:

  1. Kayla,
    Great job on explaining Mean Absolute Deviation. I am not going to lie, you definitely cleared it up for me! I was a little confused on this topic, but your explanation was simple and direct. Great job! I will definitely use the activities you listed in the future!

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  2. I love how used the correct vocabulary and explained the activity thoroughly for us to understand. My problem with this activity is that I know what your trying to find but I got very lost on how to perform MAD. On the other hand it looks like you understood it very wee. Thank you for all the website suggestions you left, I know I will be using them for the final. Great job and good luck in your finals.

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  3. Hi, Kayla. You did an amazing job at clearing up MAD for me in an easy to understand and follow blog post, with correct vocab to boot! I like that you included an activity in the end so that anyone who wanted to do this activity could with just a click of a button. Great Job!

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