Josh Fernandes #703 Math 8, per.

2 6th Grade Math Project

When my English teacher, Mrs. DeVries, first told me that I had to write an essay about anthropometry which the other students in my class had learned about, I thought it would be impossible, and to top it all off, I didnt know what anthropometry meant. Soon after, I learned that anthropometry is the study of the measurements of the human body. It sounded interesting, but I had never measured any parts of my body before, and besides, how is measuring bones related to math? I was totally confused, so I asked Mrs. Schwartz, the math teacher, how measuring bones is related to math. She explained that the point of this project was to think about measuring people in a different perspective- by their bone length. By gaining this knowledge, she wanted us to realize that math is in everything that people use. The plan in this project was to measure three body lengths- the radius, the humorous, and the tibia. Then, the class would put their result from all the thirteen classmates into a graph, then measure the same body parts of six teachers, and put those measurements into the graph as well. Math is used in your everyday life, from measuring your bones to finding out your height. To begin with, the students measured their own radius, and then put their own measurements along with those of the class into a graph. Each student measured their own radius length by using a tape measure, and stretching it from their wrist to the crease in the elbow. Sterling, who was my partner, had a radius length of nine inches. The class then added all the measurements in their class to find out the mean, median, mode, and range. They first found out how to measure the mean, which is the average of all the measurements, which had a value of 8.3 inches. Next, they learned how to compute the median, which is the middle value in the set of lengths put in increasing order, and found it to be 8.5 inches. After that, the students figured out the mode, which was the most common length of 8.5 inches. Finally, the students measured the range, which is the largest length subtracted by the shortest, and showed a value of 2 inches. After that, Mrs. Schwartz sent every student a linear graph, which the students used to make a scatter plot. In this plot, the class inserted all the radius lengths in the graph, putting the persons radius on the x-axis, which is the side that goes left to right, and their height on the y-axis, which goes top to bottom. The students then separated the girls from the boys by putting blue dots for the girls and yellow dots for the boys, and put a straight line through the graph, representing the average for all the values. After these steps were completed, they had their graph, estimated heights based upon the titles of the x-axis, which had a title of radius in inches, and the y-axis, which had a title

of height in inches.

Once the graph was completed, my classmates learned about the lengths of two other bones, and measured the lengths of these bones in six teachers to see which bone measurement was the closest to their actual height. First, the students learned the formulas for measuring the body parts, and when the formulas were learned, the students measured their humerus, which is the arm bone from the shoulder to the elbow, and the tibia, which is the leg bone from the kneecap to the foot. My partner had measurements of 11.5 inches for his humerus, and 15.5 inches for his tibia. He then used the formula table by substituting the variable for the length of the body part. Sterling, my partner, predicted his humerus to be 62.5 inches and for his tibia to measure 69.4 inches after both had been inserted into the formulas. For the most part, the formulas showed the

humerus being the closest to the actual height of someone, just as it was for my partner. Sydney L, one of my classmates, was 1.1 inches less than my partners height.

Mrs. Schwartz then gave each student a piece of paper that had the names of six teachers on it. They then projected what they thought the teachers heights would be, and then saw their actual heights in inches. Since everyone knew the formulas, each person used the heights to find the humerus, radius, and tibia lengths of each teacher. The predicted measurements that Sterling had made were not as accurate as they had been before when measuring his own body. After comparing all the information with each other, the students discovered that the humerus, just as it had been for the class and for my partner, was the closest estimate to the actual height of the teachers. In conclusion, I thought highly about math, and how some part of it is in almost everything. I mostly enjoyed learning about the different body parts, and how they somewhat relate to the actual height of a person. If I could give any advice to an archaeologist or a forensic

student about predicting height from a bone length, I would tell them to remember the formulas. This process can be simple, but you must remember the various formulas that there are, because even the slightest difference can result in the incorrect height. Although this anthropometry project was a bit difficult because of the sudden adjustment to a new subject that I have not yet learned about, I greatly enjoyed the project. Before this project, I thought that math was just a bunch of graphs and signs, but I now realize that everything has to do with it, and practically everything can be calculated using formulas, from measuring the height of a person, to looking for the area in a sphere.