ShmoopTube

00:04

Mean, Median and Mode, a la Shmoop.

00:07

Dr. Bozo Bizarro… it’s his given name, we swear… has been having some… technical difficulty.

00:13

His time machine has been going completely haywire. [Dr Bizarro electrocuted by a time machine]

00:16

In the last 24 hours, he has visited each of these years, in this order:

00:22

As a dedicated mad scientist, he must record and analyze all data. [Person scribbling data on a notepad]

00:27

According to his data of all the years he has visited, which of these are true?

00:32

The mean is 2170…

00:33

The median is 2170…

00:35

or the mode is 2170?

00:37

Here are your choices:

00:40

First things first – mode. Because it’s the easiest. [Father and child eating ice cream]

00:44

Mode is all about frequency – how often does a particular number occur in a series?

00:49

So… which year did Dr. Bizarro visit most often?

00:53

Wouldn’t you know it? That “2170” pops up three times on his list – more than any other. [2170 circled three times in a list and hand holding up three fingers appears]

00:59

So we know that number three is true. So that can let us cross off answers A and C off our list.

01:05

Next up is the mean. Which is a fancy word for average. [Hand snatches lollipop from a baby and baby cries]

01:08

Total all of the dates in your calculator, and divide by the number of years visited, which is 15.

01:15

Did you get something around 2143? We did, too. It’s not looking good for number one… [Calculations for the mean]

01:20

…so we can eliminate answer choice D.

01:23

To find our answer, we’ll need to find the median. [Car speeding down a road]

01:25

A median, just like a median you’d find on a street, is about what’s in the middle.

01:31

First, let’s put all our years in chronological order. [Selection of years placed in chronological order]

01:34

Locate the year in the exact middle of the list.

01:38

It’s 2170 again… which means that numbers two and three are true…

01:44

…and our answer is “E.”

01:45

Anyways, Dr. Bizarro has to admit, 2170 was not a bad year to spend so much time visiting. [Dr Bizarro in space]

01:51

It’s the year that his Cubs finally win the World Series. [Dr Bizarro in space and baseball hits his head]

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