Olympics Unit of Study - Open-Ended
Student Answers

The students read the passage, "The 2000 Olympic "Green" Games" then answered these questions to help them to learn how to answer Open-Ended questions.

Question 1
The effort to keep the Games green began in 1992 with the Winter Games in Lillehammer, Norway. The chart below shows the tons of trash recycled during Olympic Games starting in 1992.

Solved by Ashley N.
What is the total number of pounds of trash that was recycled at each site?  What was the grand total?
   Lillehammer, Norway - 290,000 pounds (2000 x 145)
   Atlanta, Georgia - 550,000 pounds (2000 x 275)
   Nagano, Japan - 356,000 pounds (2000 x 178)
   Sydney, Australia  - 410,000 pounds (2000 x 205)
   Grand Total - 1,606,000 pounds
Explain or show how you determined your answer.
2000 pounds = 1 ton 
I multiplied the number of tons at each site by 2000 pounds.  I added the total pounds from the four sites to calculate the grand total.

Question 2
Green frogs and Golden Bell frogs, both endangered species, live where the new sports arenas were built. The new environment protects the frogs from many of their predators. When counted, it was found that there is a population of 800 Green frogs and 1200 Golden Bell frogs. It is projected that the Green frog population will increase 12% and that the Golden Bell frog population will increase by 14% in the year following the Olympic Games.
Solved by Justin M.
What will each of their populations be at the end of the year if the projections are correct?
                                         896 Green frogs                        1368 Golden Bell frogs   
Explain or show how you determined your answer.
I calculated the percent then added to the original number.  800 Green frogs X .12 = 96 frogs (12%) then I added to the original number to make 896 Green frogs at the end of the year.  1200 Golden Bell frogs X .14 = 168 frogs (14%) then I added to the original number to make 1368 Golden Bell frogs at the end of the year.

Question 3
For the past three years, 4 million trees were planted at 500 sites around the nation of Australia, the sites commemorate Australian Olympians. Each site had the same number of tree added.
Solved by Candace W.
How many trees have been added to each site? 8,000 trees
Explain or show how you determined your answer.
I took the total number of trees 4,000,000 and divided by the number of sites 500 to find the number of trees planted at each site which was 8,000.

Question 4
Several farmers donated a total of 400,000 worms to help reduce, reuse, and recycle waste by living off the garbage produced by the cafeteria. At the end of the games it was found that they were successful in creating rich compost that filled 25 containers that were 10 feet long, 5 feet wide and 4 feet high.
Solved by Kinsey C.
How many cubic feet of compost were created from the garbage?  5000 cubic feet
Explain or show how you determined your answer.
I calculated the volume of each container by using the formula LWH and then times that number by the 25 containers.  10 feet x 5 feet x 4 feet = 200 cubic feet x 25 containers = 5,000 cubic feet of compost

Question 5
Most of the food at the Games was served on reusable ceramic plates to reduce the amount of garbage generated. It was calculated that each of the 25,000 ceramic plates was reused 175 times.
Solved by Mark L.
What is the total number of plastic/Styrofoam disposable plates that were replaced by the reuse of ceramic plates?  4,375,000
Explain or show how you determined your answer.
I took the number of ceramic plates - 25,000 and times it by the number of times each plate was reused - 175.  The total number of plastic/Styrofoam plates that were saved = 4,375,000.

Question 6
Sydney Olympic Park and the Millennium Parklands, where many of the sporting events were held, were once strewn with garbage. Rather than move the garbage to another location, it became part of the landscape. All the waste was collected into four large mounds and then covered with clay and soil. The final heights of mounds are indicated in the following table.

Solved by Selena B.
Calculate the mean, mode, and median of the mound heights.
      14.75 meters  mean           12  mode           13.5  median
Explain or show how you determined your answer.
For the mean I added all the heights of the mounds and divided by 4.
12 meters + 12 meters + 15 meters + 20 meters = 59 total meters - divided by 4 (number of mounds) = 14.75 meters for the mean
For the mode I found the most frequent mound height which was 12 meters.
For the median I put all the mound heights in order from shortest to tallest.  I took the two middle heights which were 12 and 15 and averaged them (divided by 2) which gave me 13.5 for the median.