Generating Random Samples From a Population with Known Characteristics

 Algebra 2 Skills Practice
  • 1.

    Jason wants to survey everyone in his neighbor hood about a proposal to get new street signs. There are a lot of people in his living community and he cannot survey everyone. How could Jason take a random sample from his living community to take the survey?

    Answers:

    • Ask only the males in the living community to take the survey.

    • Ask his neighbors and friends from the community to take the survey.

    • Ask only the people who walk by his house to take the survey.

    • Assign every person in his neighborhood to a number and use a random number generator to get a list of people to take the survey.

  • 2.

    Miranda wants to paint her house but is very undecided on the colors she wants to use. She has picked out too many paint chips to choose from and wants to randomly select the paint chips she will use. How might she generate a random sample of paint chips to use to paint her house?

    Answers:

    • Miranda will put all of the paint chips in a big bag, shake it up and select the paint chips without looking.

    • Miranda will line up all of the paint chips and select every 10th paint chip.

    • Miranda will only use the paint chips that her mom likes.

    • Miranda will group all of the paint chips by color and then select the paint chips she likes most from each color group.

  • 3.

    Jake wants to survey his English class about the seating arrangement. Many of Jake's friends are in that class and he wants to avoid any bias. How should Jake generate a random sample to gather information on the classes opinions of the seating arrangement?

    Answers:

    • Jake should ask the students to raise their hand if they want to take the survey, and then give it to those students.

    • Jake should survey his friends for their opinion.

    • Jake should put the name of every student in the class on a piece of paper and put it in a hat and then pick names out of the hat.

    • Jake should assign a number to every student and then only give the survey to the students with an odd number.

  • 4.

    Patricia wants to generate a random sample of tattoos she will get from her tattoo artist. The tattoo artist has numbers assigned to each tattoo design. How should Patricia go about generating a random sample of these designs?

    Answers:

    • Patricia should use a number generator to select the tattoo designs she will get.

    • Patricia should select the design if it is a multiple of 7.

    • Patricia should group the designs into groups of ten and then choose her favorite from each group.

    • Patricia should let the tattoo artist select the ones he likes best.

  • 5.

    Matt wants to randomly select people from his workplace to attend a farmers market to represent their company. There are too many people for Matt to be able to ask individually. How should matt generate a random sample to attend the farmers market event?

    Answers:

    • Matt should put everyone's name at his work place into a name generator and send the people that are selected.

    • Matt should only select people from the marketing department.

    • Matt should get to work early and select the people who are the first to arrive to work.

    • Matt should only send his favorite coworkers.

  • 6.

    A manager want to randomly select a few people to be the employees of the month. There are a large number of employees at the company. How should the manager generate a random sample of employees to be selected for employee of the month?

    Answers:

    • The manager should assign every employee to a number, then put all of the numbers in a big bag, shake it up, and then select a few employees.

    • The manager should group the employees by department and then select one from each department.

    • The manager should select the employees that are the last to leave work.

    • The manager should select the employees with the highest sales.

  • 7.

    A lunch lady wants to survey the students about the quality of food that they are purchasing. There is such a large number of students who buy their lunch that it will be too difficult to survey every student. How should the lunch lady generate a random sample to give the survey?

    Answers:

    • The lunch lady should group the students by grade and then survey a student from each grade.

    • The lunch lady should only survey the student who are first in the lunch line.

    • The lunch lady should taste the food and determine the quality of food herself.

    • The lunch lady should put the students lunch numbers into a number generator and survey those that are chosen by the number generator.

  • 8.

    A town planner want to survey the people in his city to determine if a new children's park should be built. There is a large number of people in his town. How should the town planner generate a random sample to get the survey complete?

    Answers:

    • The town planner should assign a number to all the residents of the town and then use a number generator to generate who the surveys will go to.

    • The town planner should survey everyone who walks into the city hall.

    • The town planner should survey everyone who live on his street.

    • The town planner should visit the other parks in the city and survey the people at the parks.

  • 9.

    An animal shelter want to survey all the clients who have adopted an animal from them. Because there have been so many adoptions, the shelter cannot afford to survey everyone. How can the shelter generate a random sample of people to send the survey to?

    Answers:

    • The shelter should have only the clients who have adopted in the past month to take the survey.

    • The shelter should send the survey to only the women who have adopted from them.

    • The shelter should group the clients by the animal they adopted and then choose from each group.

    • The shelter should gather all the names of clients who have adopted from them and put it in a name generator.

  • 10.

    In gym class the gym teacher wants to randomly select the dodgeball teams. How should the gym teacher generate a random sample?

    Answers:

    • The teacher should select the teams by grouping them by gender.

    • The gym teacher should put all the students names in a hat and select the team each student will be on by pulling it out of the hat.

    • The gym teacher should let the students choose their teams.

    • The teacher should separate group the students according to their birthday.

  • 11.

    A boutique wants to do monthly giveaways for customers. The boutique wants to randomly select 2 customers to win the giveaway. How should the boutique generate a random sample?

    Answers:

    • The boutique should ask every customer for their phone number to enter them into the give away, then draw 2 phone numbers from a bag to choose the winners.

    • The boutique should ask each customer for their email and then chose the winners alphabetically.

    • The boutique should choose the winners based on the highest purchases of the month.

    • The determine the winners by only choosing from the women customers.

  • 12.

    Maria wants to survey the customers that have purchased items at her store for feedback. There are too many shoppers for Maria to survey everyone. How could Maria generate a random sample of shoppers?

    Answers:

    • Maria should walk around the parking lot and give everyone she sees the survey.

    • Maria should put the customers transaction numbers from their receipts into a number generator to select who will get the survey.

    • Maria should set a stack of the surveys in the store and let the customers decide if they want to take it.

    • Maria should sit at the exit of the store and survey the shoppers as they leave.

  • 13.

    A florist wants to make a random bouquet of flowers for her friend. There are so many options of flowers to choose from. How should the florist randomly select the flowers for the bouquet?

    Answers:

    • The florist should let a random customer pick out the flowers.

    • The florist should put all the names of the flowers into a name generator and use the generator to select the flowers.

    • The florist should group all the flowers by color and then choose her favorite from each color group.

    • The florist should ask her friend what flowers she would want.

  • 14.

    Morgan cannot decide what color nail polish she wants to choose for her manicure. Each nail polish color is labeled with a number. How could Morgan generate a random sample from all the nail polish colors?

    Answers:

    • Morgan should use a number generator to chose a nail polish color.

    • Morgan should choose a color she has never done before.

    • Morgan should group all the nail polishes by similar color and then choose from each group.

    • Morgan should ask the nail lady to choose a color for her.

  • 15.

    An abstract artist wants to pick random colors for a new commissioned painting. How should the artist randomly select the paint colors?

    Answers:

    • The artist should only choose their favorite colors.

    • The artist should put all the paint tubes in a big bag, shake it up, and then choose the colors without looking.

    • The artist should ask a friend to choose the colors.

    • The artist should separate the colors into primary and secondary colors and then choose from each group.

  • 16.

    A gardener wants to choose what kind of vegetables to grow this season. There are too many choices of vegetables that he could grow. How could the gardener generate a random sample to select the vegetables he will grow this season?

    Answers:

    • The gardener should use the barcode of the seed packets and choose only the ones that start with an even number.

    • The gardener could put all the names of the vegetables in a hat and then draw out the vegetables that he will plant.

    • The gardener should call his mom and get her recommendation.

    • The gardener should let a worker at the gardening store choose for him.

  • 17.

    Joey went trick or treating and cannot decide what kind of candy he wants to eat. There are too many pieces of candy to choose from. How should Joey randomly select the candy to eat?

    Answers:

    • Joey should separate the candy into groups and then choose from each group.

    • Joey should ask his friend to pick out the candy for him.

    • Joey should put all the candy in a big bag, shake it up and then draw out the pieces to eat.

    • Joey should number each piece of candy and then only choose the ones that are prime numbers.

  • 18.

    A jeweler is making a custom charm bracelet and cannot decide what charms to put on the bracelet. How could the jeweler generate a random sample to use on the charm bracelet?

    Answers:

    • The jeweler should assign a number to each charm and then select the ones with odd numbers.

    • The jeweler should assign a number to each charm, then put all the numbers in a hat and draw out the numbers for the charms to be used.

    • The jeweler should ask every person that walks into the jewelry store that day to choose a charm.

    • The jeweler should separate the charms by color and then select a charm from each group.

  • 19.

    A custom rug maker is making a rug for a customer. The customer asked the rug maker to surprise her with the color choice. How could the rug maker generate a random sample of colors to use for the rug?

    Answers:

    • The rug maker should post a poll on Facebook for his friends to vote on.

    • The rug maker should assign each color a number and then choose only the numbers that are even.

    • The rug maker should write down each color, then put them all in a bag, shake it up, and then choose each color with out looking.

    • The rug maker should choose only secondary colors.

  • 20.

    A donut shop is trying to decide on what their donut of the week should be. There are so many flavors of donuts to choose from the donut shop is having trouble deciding. How could the donut shop generate a random sample flavor to be the donut of the week?

    Answers:

    • The donut shop should ask every customer that day what their favorite flavor is and then the winning flavor as the donut of the week.

    • The donut shop should survey only the children that enter the store that day what the donut of the week should be.

    • The donut shop should put all of the flavors of donuts in a name generator and use the generator to select the flavor.

    • The donut shop should separate the donuts onto categories and choose one from each categories to narrow it down to one flavor.

  • 21.

    A college campus is hosting a cookout. The college wants to survey the students about what kind of food should be served. There are too many students to ask everyone. How should the college generate a random sample to determine what food will be served?

    Answers:

    • The college should has a majority of male students, so they should send the survey to only the male students.

    • The college should put every students ID number into a number generator and let the generator select the student for the survey.

    • The college should group the students by age and only send the surveys to students who are 20.

    • The college should give the survey out to the first 50 cars to arrive in the parking lot in the morning.

  • 22.

    A librarian wants to choose a few books for the kids story time. There are so many children's books to choose from and the librarian is having trouble picking out the books. How could the librarian generate a random sample of story time books?

    Answers:

    • the librarian should let the first parents to arrive choose the books.

    • The librarian should let the kids choose.

    • The librarian should put the bar code of all the children's books in a number generator to pick the books to be read.

    • The librarian should separate the books by color of the cover and then select a book from each group.

  • 23.

    Chloe can only bring one friend to the concert with her. Chloe has a lot of friends who want to go with her and she doesn't want to hurt anyone's feelings. How can Chloe generate a random sample to choose one friend without hurting any of her friends feelings?

    Answers:

    • Chloe should choose her favorite friend.

    • Chloe should group her friends by gender and choose one from each group and then narrow it down to one person.

    • Chloe should ask survey her friend to find out who wants to go to the concert the most.

    • Chloe should write everyone's name down and draw one out of a hat.

  • 24.

    The state fair is giving away prizes to people who buy their raffle tickets. How should the fair choose the winners of the raffle?

    Answers:

    • The fair should select every raffle ticket purchase by anyone that is 23 to be the winners.

    • The fair should put all of the raffle tickets into a big box, mix it up, and then draw out the winners of the raffle.

    • The fair should select the raffle tickets with only even numbers to be the winners.

    • The fair should group the raffle ticket by male and female and choose a few winners from each group.

  • 25.

    Lexi is having a baby and wants to find out what kind of diaper is the best diaper. Lexi wants to survey her moms group but she cannot survey everyone. How could Lexi randomly select the moms to take her survey?

    Answers:

    • Lexi should put every moms name into a box, mix it up, and then draw out the names of the moms she will survey.

    • Lexi should assign a number to every mom and then give the survey to the moms with an odd number.

    • Lexi should give the survey to her closest friend in the moms group.

    • Lexi should give the survey to the first 10 moms to show up to the group.

  • 26.

    A company wants select a business to sponsor. The company wants to avoid all bias in deciding what business to sponsor. The company gathers all of the business cards that could potentially be selected. How could the company randomly select a business to sponsor?

    Answers:

    • The company should call each number on the business card, and the first business to not not pick up the phone is the winner.

    • The company should put all the business cards in a bag, shake it up, and then draw the winner out of the bag.

    • The company should number the cars and then ask a customer to pick a random number.

    • The company should group the business by service and then select their favorites to narrow down to one.

  • 27.

    A car dealership wants to survey the customers about their favorite color of car. How should the company generate a random sample of customers to take the survey?

    Answers:

    • The car dealership should assign a number to every customer transaction and then use a number generator to select who will be given the survey.

    • The car dealership should survey only the women that have purchased a car from them.

    • The car dealership should survey all the employees.

    • The car dealership should survey only the people that walk in that day.

  • 28.

    A home improvement store wants to survey customers about what kind of lawn equipment they use. The store cannot survey everyone. How should the store go about generating a random sample to take their survey?

    Answers:

    • The store should survey the first 100 customers in the store that day.

    • The store should instead survey all of the employees.

    • The store should use the transaction numbers of all their customers and put it in a number generator to determine who will tale the survey.

    • The store should choose 1 customer from every day of the week.

  • 29.

    A college student wants to survey other students about what their favorite flavor of ramen noodles are. There are too many students on campus to ask everyone. How should the student generate a random sample of students to take the survey?

    Answers:

    • The student should take every dorm room number on campus and put it in a number generator to generate which student from the dorms should take the survey.

    • The student should ask their parents what their favorite ramen flavor was when they were in college.

    • The student should ask all of their teachers what the students overall favorite flavor of ramen is.

    • The student should ask 1 person from every class they attend that day.

  • 30.

    A furniture store is wanting to give away a few $1000 gift cards to all the customers who have taken their survey. There were so many people who took their survey that the store doesn't know how to choose the winners. How should the furniture store generate a random sample of winners?

    Answers:

    • The store should group the surveyors by gender and then select a few winners from each group.

    • The store should only give the gift card to people who are 27 and took the survey.

    • The store should assign a number to each survey and then write it down to draw each winner out of a hat.

    • The store should select the winner by the people who submitted more than one survey.

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