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Question:

jacarkai
jacarkai
Student

What is the median of

56,57,59,59,60,60,60,60,60,61,61,61,62,62,62,62,63,63,64,64,

64,64, 65,65,66,66,68?

My answer was 93.

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Posted by jacarkai on Tuesday March 24, 2009 at 1:01 AM and tagged with math, median.

Answers:


  1. dymatsuoka

    eNotes Editor

    The median of a series of numbers is the middle number when all the numbers are arranged in order.  You already have your series arranged in order, so you are halfway done.  There are two ways you can find the median.  The first way is just to do it visually - that is, count from both ends until you end up in the middle.  Fortunately, in this series, there is an odd number of numbers.  The middle number is 62, which is the fourteenth number; there are thirteen numbers on either side of it.

    The other way you can do it is by using a formula.  The formula I have always used is (the total number of numbers + 1) divided by two.  In this case, the total number of numbers, if you count them all up, is 27, so (27 +1) = 28, divided by 2 is 14.  The fourteenth number, which is 62, is the median.

    Things get a little more difficult when there are an even number of numbers in the series.  The formula still works in that case, but if you are doing it visually, you will find two numbers in the actual middle.  You would then have to figure out the average of the two numbers to determine the median. 

     

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    Posted by dymatsuoka on Tuesday March 24, 2009 at 8:21 AM