Math question, mean/median/mode

[HeartDrama]

I'm trying to analyze data for one of my classes. I've isolated 21 students as a specific subgroup. I want to know the mode. There are 3 different scores that are each repeated 4 times. What is the mode? The average of those 3 scores?
My scores out of 15:
5
5
5
7
7
7
7
8
8
9
9
11
11
11
11
12
12
12
12
13
14

Is the mode 10? Is the mean 9?

[HeartDrama]

How do you figure out the mode if you have one of each number?
6
7
8
12
13
14

[stampin'teacher]

The mode is the most frequent number seen in a set of data. If they are all equal, you would have no mode. If there are two numbers (let's say) that you see the most of, then you have two modes.

[HeartDrama]

No mode? Two modes? How would I illustrate that on a chart? See this is what happens when English teachers try to teach math. My professor said to take the average of them. Or maybe she said that about the median.

[Math]

The mode is supposed to be the number that appears the most. I was always told you can have more than one mode. Yes, but there could definitely be no mode.

[Shanoo]

Originally Posted by HeartDrama

No mode? Two modes? How would I illustrate that on a chart? See this is what happens when English teachers try to teach math. My professor said to take the average of them. Or maybe she said that about the median.

If you have two numbers in the middle of a data set, you calculate the average of the two numbers as the median. If you have 4 numbers repeated the same amount of times in a data set, you have 4 modes.

[Math]

The mean is the average so you would add those up get a number and divide by how many numbers you added together.

[TeacherGroupie]

The mode isn't the average of anything, no: it's the score that appears most often in the data set, and you can indeed have more than one of them.

You have a trimodal distribution here, with four 7's, four 11's, and four 12's - though for the relatively small number of data points you've got here, identifying that many modes is kind of silly; I'd be inclined to put an asterisk in the chart where the mode is supposed to go and explain it below.

When all the numbers are unique or all tie, you've got no mode; fill that space on the chart with an asterisk if you feel like explaining below or "N/A" if you don't. Anyone who understands the concept should know what is intended; anyone who demands that there must be a mode doesn't understand the concept.

Average and mean are the same thing: sum up the scores and divide by the number of scores. In this case, 196/21 = 9.33.

9 is the median here: the middle-most number, if you will.

[Upsadaisy]

And remember that the median is the middle when the data is recorded in ascending or descending order.

[TeacherGroupie]

I did take the ordering of the data for granted, didn't I, 'daisy? (Bad TG: no shortbread.)