How to create histograms - GCSE Mathematics questions

Histogram questions

appear on many GCSE Mathematics exam papers and you can download some example questions from here. They can be a little challenging and please do practice all of the problems – here’s the link to the answers.

Histograms are used quite a lot in statistics and are really just a more sophisticated type of bar chart. The difference is that a histogram shows ‘continuous’ data and there aren’t any gaps between each of the bars. If you were creating a display of ages of children you would tend to use a histogram, as age continues.

A bar chart represents ‘discrete’ information – each bar is on its own. A typical use would be items sold (vertical axis) on each day of a week (along the bottom axis).

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Top Tips!

The main things to remember when working with histogram questions are:

– Learn the formula ‘frequency density = frequency / class width
– Pretty much anything else goes from there!
– Remember that ‘frequency density’ is always on the vertical axis and ‘class width’ is always on the horizontal axis
– Try to construct your diagram in such a way that it doesn’t look too squashed

Here’s a ‘cheat sheet’ to download – it might help with your revision

If you’d like to ask for any more detail, or you’re not sure about anything, please do ask a question in the comments section.

All best with your studies 🙂

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