Education Technology


VIC: Calculator BlackJack

by Texas Instruments

Objectives

  • Collect multiple sample means to produce a sampling distribution
  • Understand the relationship between sample size and standard error
  • Determine experimental methods to increase confidence about the mean.

Vocabulary

  • Sampling distribution
  • Sample mean
  • Standard error

About the Lesson

Students start by exploring a couple of games of Calculator Blackjack with a view to gaining an estimate for the quantity of numbers generated to make a player 'bust'. Multiple games are then played using simulation and subsequent samples of the mean results is graphed. The distribution of the sample means produces an approximately normal distribution and so the Central Limit Theorem is introduced informally.