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Math Essay

The document discusses a student's experience participating in an anthropometry project where they measured bones like the radius, humerus and tibia of classmates and teachers. They graphed the data and used formulas to predict heights based on the bone measurements. The student found the humerus formula worked best to predict their own height and a classmate's height accurately.

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64 views

Math Essay

The document discusses a student's experience participating in an anthropometry project where they measured bones like the radius, humerus and tibia of classmates and teachers. They graphed the data and used formulas to predict heights based on the bone measurements. The student found the humerus formula worked best to predict their own height and a classmate's height accurately.

Uploaded by

Awagle1
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Abigail #716 Math 6, per.

Anthropometry Project

When you hear the word bones you really do not think about math, do you? Until one week ago, I, too, thought that bones had absolutely nothing to do with math until I learned the meaning of anthropometry. Anthropos means human and metrikos means measuring, so anthropometry means human measuring. The plan for this project was to demonstrate that we use math outside of the classroom more than we think. Mrs. Schwartz showed us The Bone Detective website and told us about Diane Frances, who is a forensic scientist. All 5 teachers, 16 students, and a faculty member were involved in this project. Measuring bones to predict actual height is how I learned that you use math much more than you ever thought possible. First, on day one and two, we focused on measuring the radius and height of each student and then graphed the collected data. The radius is a bone in your arm that is connected to your hand and elbow, and we measured it by putting a tape measure up against the bump on your wrist and stopping it at your elbow. I have a radius of 8 inches and a height of 62 inches. After we measured and recorded the heights and radiuses of all 16 students, we calculated four measurements. First, we calculated the mean (the average) of the radiuses, which was 8.5 inches, second the median of the radius (the middle number) and it was 8.25 inches, third was the mode (number that occurs most often), and it was 8 inches, and forth was the range (the difference between the highest and the lowest measurements), which was 1.5 inches. On day two, we made a scatter graph Radius in Inches (above) by plotting our heights and radiuses. The X-axis (horizontal) shows how large our radius was in inches, and the Y-axis (vertical) represents how tall we were in inches. We placed the dots (the pink dots represent the girls and the blue dots represent the boys) on the graph to correlate with each students radius and height measurement. Next, we placed a line on the scatter graph to signify the average, and we placed it where the majority of dots were. Students can use the graph to estimate height by determining where the radius in inches intersects with the average black line on the graph. Second, on day three and four, we measured two other bones, the humerus and the tibia, and then used those measurements in formulas to predict the actual height of all participants. First, we measured the humerus, the bone that is in your shoulder and ends at your elbow, using a tape
Height in Inches

measure to measure from our shoulder to our elbow and then we recorded the measurement. Next, we measured the tibia, the bone that starts at your kneecap and ends at your foot, using a tape measure and measuring from the kneecap to the beginning of your foot and then we recorded the measurements. My humerus is 11.5 inches and my tibia is 14 inches. Then, we used the formulas (left) to predict how tall we currently are by plugging in our measurement numbers into each formula on the table to the left. My predicted heights were 63.6 inches using the tibia formula, 61.25 inches using the humerus formula, and 60.1 inches using the radius formula. For me, the humerus formula was most accurate because it was only .75 inches off from my actual height and another student in my class was only .15 inches off using the same formula! On day four, we were given a sheet with each teachers bone measurements and we were able to use the formulas on the teachers as well! When we used the formulas on the teachers, they did not come as close to their actual heights as we did using the formulas with the students measurements. The formula that worked best for the teachers was the humerus formula; however, I think that the bone measurements of the teachers were not as accurate as the students measurements, so that is why the formulas did not work as well in predicting their heights. In conclusion, measuring bones to predict actual height is how I learned that you use math much more than you ever thought possible. What I loved about this project was almost everything, but mostly I liked the measuring each others bones. However, it was difficult and frustrating when the formulas did not work as well as I had predicted, usually because of inaccurate measurements. Overall, it is amazing to learn that we use math in our daily lives without even knowing it! I trust the formulas we used so much, that if I were talking to a forensic scientist, such as Diane Frances, I would be able to say, Use this formula, I know it works, but make sure you have accurate measurements first!

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