Bobcat Stats

Imagine you have been assigned to care for a male bobcat in a zoo. You measure the animal’s weight and height (carefully!), and find that it is 24 inches high and weighs 7.2 kilograms.

Do you think the bobcat might be underweight?

Subject: Mathematics
Topics: Statistics
Grades: 7 - 12
Concepts:
- Correlation (explicit)
Knowledge and Skills:
- Can create a scatter plot
- Can determine whether or not a scatter plot of given data indicates positive, negative, or no correlation

Download Activity: Bobcat Stats (PDF)

Hands-On Math Movie:

America's Teaching ZooMoorpark Zoo: Managing Exotic Animals

Today’s homework: Hand-feed tigers, divvy up raw meat for hyenas and teach the sea lion to play hide and seek. Show your students why math, especially measurement, is an essential tool when it comes to caring for animals.
Running time 4:58 minutes.

Watch the Movie