The Trial: it should only have two outcomes, such as “heads or tails”, “would I make it to work on time or not”, or “students who pass or fail Math 2”, etc. Also need to decide how many trials you would do.

Learning Goal: I’m working on a statistics discussion question and need support to help me learn.

I. (9 points) Design a binomial experiment – you would need three things

1. The Trial: it should only have two outcomes, such as “heads or tails”, “would I make it to work on time or not”, or “students who pass or fail Math 2”, etc. Also need to decide how many trials you would do.
2. The Theoretical Percentage of Success for each trial: you may not know this, so give me a good, educated guess.
3. What’s the probability of “x times” happening?

Now calculate the mean, the standard deviation, and the probability for one example of “x”

My example –

The Trial: Finding a parking spot in Ontario Mills (a mall) right in front of the theater on a Sunday. I’m going there 5 times. (“Success” means you found a spot right in front of the theater.)

The Theoretical Percentage of Success each trial: 20% (that’s my guess of finding a parking spot in front of the theater on any given Sunday.)

What’s the percentage of “Success” all 5 times? From Table A-1, n=5 (total trials), p=0.2 (theoretical probability), x=5 (how many times I want to see it happen), the probability is 0.00032 – which means that my chance of finding a spot to park in front of the theater on a Sunday all five times is 3/10000.

II. (8 points) Design a second experiment with a cumulative outcome – for example, using the parking example above, “what’s my chance of finding a spot to park in front of the theater on a Sunday AT LEAST three out of five times?” Demonstrate how you would calculate that probability.

(Note: You must post before seeing other posts.)

III. (8 points) Respond thoughtfully and substantively to another person’s post – did they calculate their probabilities correctly? Do you share a similar experience as they do? What would you suggest to improve on their probabilities? (Generic responses that do not specifically addressing the post you are responding to, that I feel you could use to respond to any post will result in zero points.)