Probability Grade -8

Getting started:
1. This is a spinner.
Each colour is equally likely.
a. Find the probability of green.
b. Find the probability of blue or yellow.

2. An unbiased 6 – sided dice is thrown.

Work out the probability of getting
a. 3
b. 6
c. An even number
d. Less than 5.

3. Tomorrow at 11:00 it will be sunny, cloudy or wet.

The probability it will be sunny is 25% and the probability it will be cloudy is 40%.

4. A large number of drawing pins are dropped on the floor.

87 land point up and 135 land point down.
Work out the experimental probability of landing point up.

Do you know the game ‘rock, paper, scissors’? it is a very old game and is known by
other names as well.
Two people simultaneously show either a first (rock), the first two fingers pointing
forwards (scissors) or an open hand (paper).
Scissors beats paper, paper beats rock and rock
beats scissors. This is because scissors cut paper,
paper wraps rock and rock blunts scissors
If both players choose the same thing it is a draw
(neither wins) and they play again.

This may seem a trivial game but in 2005 the

Maspro Denkoh electronics corporation used it
to decide whether to give the contract to auction
its $20 million collection of paintings to
Sotheby’s or to Christie’s auction houses.

Christie’s won with paper, after taking the advice of Flora and Alice, the 11 – year –
old daughters of one of the directors of the company.
Their argument was that for beginners, rock seems strongest, so they tend to start
with that. Playing against a beginner, you should start with paper.

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This game illustrates two methods of finding probabilities.
One method is to say that each different play – rock, scissors, paper – is equally likely.
If the three outcomes are equally likely, each one has a probability of 1/3.

Flora and Alice realized that, for less experienced players, the outcomes are not
equally likely. The probability of starting with rock is more than 1/3.

Calculating probabilities

In this section you will:

 Find the probability of complementary events
 Use lists and diagrams to show equally likely outcomes
 Use lists and diagrams of outcomes to calculate
probabilities.

This is a spinner.
The probability that it points to red is 0.2.
The probability that it points to blue is 0.15.
We can write those probabilities as P(red) = 0.2 and P(blue) = 0.15
The sum of the probabilities for all six colours is 1.
This means the probability the spinner does not point to red,
P(not red) = 1 – 0.2 = 0.8
The probability the spinner does not point to blue,
P(not blue) = 1 – 0.15 = 0.85

Getting blue and not getting blue are

complementary events.
One of them must happen and they cannot both
happen.

If A is an event and A’ is the complementary event,

Then P(A’) = 1 – p(A)

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Worked example:
The probability that it will be sunny tomorrow is 40%.
The probability it will not rain tomorrow is 95%.
Find the probability that tomorrow
a. Will not be sunny
b. It will rain.
Answer:
a. P(not sunny) = 1 – P(sunny) = 100% - 40% = 60%
b. P(rain) = 1 – P(not rain) = 100% - 95% = 5%

Worked example:
Two unbiased 6 – sided dice are thrown.
Find the probability of getting
a. The same number on both dice
b. A total of 6
c. A total of 9 or more

Answer:
a. The diagram shows all possible outcomes.
There are 36 outcomes altogether.
The loop shows the outcomes with the same number: (1, 1), (2, 2) and so on.
There are 6 of them.
The probability is which is equivalent to
b. This table shows the total for each outcome
Five outcomes give a total of 6(shown by a blue
loop)
The probability is .
c. Using the same table as for part b. ten outcomes
give a total of 9, 10, 11 or 12 (shown by the red
loop).
The probability is = .
For example, 5 on the first dice and 3 on the second gives a total of 8.

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 Think like a mathematician:

Investigate the possible outcomes when 4 fair coins are thrown.

You should find all the possible outcomes and find probabilities of different events.

In this exercise you have used different methods to find out comes. What are they?
Which do you prefer and why?

Experimental and theoretical probabilities

In this section you will:
Calculate experimental probabilities and compare them to
theoretical probabilities.

you can use equally likely outcomes to calculate probabilities.

When this is not possible you can do an experiment.

A spreadsheet is used to simulate throwing a dice 200 times.

Here are the results of the experiment.

From the information in the table, we can work out the experimental probabilities:
 the experimental probability of 1 is 30/200 = 0.15
 the experimental probability of 2 is 36/200 = 0.18
 the experimental probability of an even number is = = 0.49
we know that each number is equally likely with a fair dice so we can also calculate
the theoretical probabilities:
 the theoretical probability of 1 is = 0.167 to 3 d.p.
 the theoretical probability of 2 is = 0.167 to 3 d.p.

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  the theoretical probability of an even number is = =0.5

the experimental probabilities and the theoretical probabilities are very similar. This shows
that the spread sheet simulation is reliable.
Worked example:
Read what Marcus says.

a. Calculate the experimental probability of each outcome.

b. Calculate the theoretical probability of each outcome.
c. Marcus’s teacher thinks Marcus has made up his results.
What do you think? Give a reason for your answer.
Answer:
a. The experimental probability of 2 heads is 17/50 = 0.34

The experimental probability of 2 tails is 14/50 = 0.28

The experimental probability of 1 head and 1 tail is 19/50 = 0.38

b. There are four equally likely outcomes: HH, HT, TH, TT

The theoretical probability of 2 heads is ¼ = 0.25

The theoretical probability of 2 tails is also ¼ = 0.25

There are two ways to get 1 head and 1 tail: HT or TH

The theoretical probability is 2/4 = ½ = 0.5

c. The experimental and theoretical probabilities are not similar.

d. It look as if Marcus may have made up his results.

Activity:
Work with another learner on this question. Each pair will need a dice.
Design and carry out an experiment to answer this question:

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Before you start, you need to decide:
 How many times to throw a dice ?
 How to record your data ?
 How to compare experimental probabilities and theoretical probabilities.
Write your plan before you start. Give reasons for your conclusion based on your
data.

In some situations, you can find theoretical probabilities based on equal likelihood and you
can also find experimental probabilities. What is the connection between the way?

on Sunday 3 June 2012 there was a jubilee pageant in London.

One thousand boats travelled down the River Thames through the city of London. The
pageant was held to celebrate the fact that Queen Elizabeth ii had been on the throne for 60
years. The pageant started at 14:30 and lasted about 3 hours. The chart shows a weather
forecast for London on that day.

The forecast was made on Friday morning, two days before the pageant. It predicted the
weather every two hours through the day. One column shows the probability of
precipitation – that means rain or snow. The probability is given as a percentage. The

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forecast reported as 80% chance of heavy rain during the pageant. The thousands of
spectators were advised to take umbrellas. The forecast predicted no gusts of wind during
the pageant.
Weather forecasts are produced by complicated computer programs.
They are available for thousands of places throughout the world.
Weather forecasts are updated regularly. You can easily find them on the internet. Try to
find a weather forecast for a place near where you live.
On the day of the pageant, it was dry until about 16:00. After that it rained steadily. There
were no gusts of wind. In this, you will learn more about predicting probabilities.

Mutually exclusive events

In this section you will:
 Learn how to use addition to find probabilities
 Use the fact that the total probability of all possible mutually
exclusive events is 1.

There are 25 balls, numbered from 1 to 25, in a bag.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25
One ball is taken out at random. Here are some possible events:
 F: the number on the ball is a multiple of 5
 S: the number on the ball is a multiple of 7
 N: the number on the ball is a multiple of 9

These events are mutually exclusive. This means only one of them can
happen at one time. The multiples of 5 in the bag are 5, 10, 15, 20 and
25, so probability of event F, P(F) = = . Similarly, the probability of
S, P(S) = and the probability of N, P(N) = .

The probability that F does not happen is 1 - = . The probability

that S does not happen is

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1- = .

What is the probability that F or S happens? This means you get 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 7, 14 or 21.
There are 8 numbers, so the probability of F or S, P(F or S) = . There is an easier way to
work this out: just add the probabilities of the separate events.

Worked example:
A spinner has section in three different colours.
The probability of landing on red is 0.35. the probability of landing on blue is 0.2.
The probability of landing on gold is 0.1.
Work out the probability of landing on
a. Red or blue
b. Neither blue nor gold.
Answer
a. Probability of red or blue = probability of red + probability of
blue = 0.35 + 0.2 = 0.55
b. Probability of blue or gold = 0.2 + 0.1 = 0.3
So the probability of neither is 1 – 0.3 = 0.7

Think like a mathematician:

You want to put black, white and yellow counters in a bag.
One counter will be chosen at random.
You want P(black) = ¼ and P(white) = 2/3
a. Work out P(yellow)
b. What is a suitable number of counters of each colour to put in the bag?

Independent events :
In this section you will:
 Learn about independent events
 Use probabilities to show whether two events are
independent or not.

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You flip a coin and then you roll a dice. Here are two events.
 A: a head on the coin
 B: a 4 on the dice

If A happens, the coin lands on a head. Then the probability of 4, P(4) = . If A does not
happen, the coin lands on a tail. Then the probability of 4, P(4), is still . Whether A
happens or not does not affect the probability of B. you say that A and B are independent
events.
Now suppose you have 10 balls, numbered from 1 to 10, in a bag.
You take out one ball at random. Here are two events.
 C: the number is odd
 D: the number is less than 4

Suppose C happens. The number is 1, 3, 5, 7 or 9. Two of these numbers are less than 4, and
so P(D) = . Now suppose C does not happen.

The number is 2, 4, 6, 8 or 10. Only one of these numbers is less than 4.

So now P(D) = .the probabilities are not the same and so C and D are not independent
events. Whether C happens or not does affect the probability of D.
Worked example:
You roll a fair dice.
Here are three events.
X: the number is even
Y: the number is more than 2
Z: the number is a prime number
A show that X and Y are independent events.
B show that X and Z are not independent events.
Answer:
a. Suppose X happens. The number is 2, 4 or 6.

Two of these three numbers are more than 2, and so P(Y) = 2/3

Suppose X does not happen. Then the number is 1, 3 or 5.

Two of these three numbers are more than 2, and so P(Y) = 2/3

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 P(Y) has not changed, and so X and Y are independent.

b. Suppose X happens. The number is 2, 4 or 6.

Only one of these numbers is a prime number, and so P(Z) = 1/3
Suppose X does not happen. Then the number is 1, 3 or 5.
Two of these numbers (3 and 5) are prime numbers, and so P(Z) = 2/3
P(Z) is not the same in both cases, and so the events X and Z are not independent.

Combined events :
In this section you will:
 Calculate the probability that two independent events both happen
 Use a tree diagram to calculate the probabilities of different outcomes.

If two events are independent, you can find the probability that both events will happen by
multiplying the separate probabilities. Suppose you flip a coin and roll a fair dice.

 The probability of a head on the coin, P(head) =

 The probability of more than 2 on the dice, P(more than 2) = =
 The probability of both, P(head and more than 2) = × = =

When you have two independent events, you can use a tree diagram to show the
outcomes and to calculate the probabilities.
Worked example:
Here are two spinners. Each spinner is spun once.

Find the probability of landing on

a. An odd number and letter A
b. Neither an odd number nor the letter A.

Answer:
P(odd) = 3/5 P(A) = ¼

P(not odd) = P(even) = 2/5 P(not A) = 1- =

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You can see in the tree diagram in worked example that there are four possible outcomes.
The probability of each outcome is the product of the probabilities on the branches. The sum
of the four probabilities is 1:

Chance experiments

Zara rolls a dice 50 times. She is looking for sixes. Here are the results.

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The top row shows the first ten rolls. The frequency of a 6 in the top row is 2. The relative
frequency of a 6 after the first ten rolls is = 0.2. after 20 rolls, the frequency of a 6 is 5 and
the relative frequency is = 0.25.

This table shows the changing relative frequency:

Rolls 10 20 30 40 50
Frequency 2 5 7 10 11
Relative 0.2 0.25 0.233 0.25 0.22
frequency

You can show these values on a graph:

The theoretical probability of getting a 6 when you roll a dice is = 0.167 to 3 d.p. the
relative frequency will keep changing as Zara rolls the dice more times.

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 Name: Grade:8 Date
Subject : Numeracy Time : 30 min Code:KS-G8-N-Pb- HT1
Skill : Acquaintance
Topic :Probability
Sub topic: Event and
complementary event

1. Two dice are thrown. Find the probability that

a both dice show 5 b one dice shows a 5 and the other does not

c neither dice shows a 5

2. Two dice are thrown. The numbers are added together.

a Find the probability that the total is
i. 5 or less

ii. more than 5

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iii. 10 or more

iv. less than 10

v. a prime number

b .Find an event with a probability of 7 /36

3. A fair coin and a fair dice are thrown. This table shows the possible outcomes

a . Complete the table.

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b . How many outcomes are there? Are they all equally likely?

Name: Grade:8 Date

Subject : Numeracy Time : 30 min Code:KS-G8-N-Pb- CT1
Skill : Insight
Topic :Probability
Sub topic: Event and
complementary event

1. Two fair coins are flipped. Copy and complete this table to show the outcomes
a. Find the probability of
i 2 heads

ii 2 tails

iii a head and a tail.

b. Read what Arun says:

Explain why Arun is not correct

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c. Another way to show the outcomes when two fair coins are thrown is a tree diagram.

2. a. Three fair coins are thrown. One possible outcome is HHH, a head on all three coins. List
all the possible outcomes .

b. When three fair coins are thrown, find the probability of

i . 3 heads

ii . 3 tails

iii. not getting 3 heads

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iv. 2 heads and 1 tail

v . 1 head and 2 tails

Name: Grade:8 Date

Subject : Numeracy Time : 30 min Code:KS-G8-N-Pb- CT2
Skill : Insight
Topic :Probability
Sub topic: Experimental
Probability

1. A learner throws a coin 50 times. This table shows the results

a . Use the first row of the table to calculate the experimental probability of a head based on
the first 10 throws.

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b . Use the first two rows of the table to calculate the experimental probability of a head
based on 20 throws.

2. This spinner has 3 sectors. The probability of red, P(red)=0.6 The probability of white,
P(white)=0.3 The probability of blue, P(blue)=0.1

Here are the results of 50 spins

a. Use each row to find an experimental probability of red based on 10 spins.

b .Find two different sets of 25 spins and use them to find the experimental probability of
red.

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c . Use all 50 spins to find experimental probabilities of red, white and blue.

Name: Grade:8 Date

Subject : Numeracy Time : 30 min Code:KS-G8-N-Pb- HT3
Skill : Acquaintance
Topic :Probability
Sub topic: Mutually Exclusive
Events

1. The probability a football team will win its next match is 60%. The probability it will draw
is 15%. Work out the probability it will lose .

2. You roll a fair dice. Work out the probability of rolling

a. a 3

b . an even number

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c . a 3 or an even number

2.A bag contains a large number of coloured balls. The balls are yellow, green, brown, blue
and pink. P(yellow) = 0.1 P(green) = 0.25 P(brown) = 0.35 P(blue) = 0.05
A ball is taken out of the bag at random.
Work out the probability that the ball is
a. green or blue

b . brown or yellow

c . yellow, green or brown

d . pink

3. There are counters of four different colours in a bag. A counter is taken out at random.
This table shows the probabilities of different colours.

Find the probability that the counter is

a. gold or silver

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b. not gold

c . silver or bronze

Name: Grade:8 Date

Subject : Numeracy Time : 30 min Code:KS-G8-N-Pb- HT4
Skill : Acquaintance
Topic :Probability
Sub topic: Independent Events

1. A coin is flipped twice. Here are two events.

F: the first flip is a head
S: the second flip is a head
Explain why F and S are independent events.

2. There are ten balls in a bag. Three balls are black and seven balls are white
a One ball is chosen at random and then replaced. Then a second ball is chosen at random.
Here are two events.
F: the first ball is black
S: the second ball is black

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Are F and S independent? Give a reason for your answer.

3. A fair dice is rolled twice. Find the probability of

a. a 5 and then a 3

b. an even number and then a 6

c . a 2 and then an odd number

4. The probability that Arun is late for school is 0.1 The probability that Marcus is late for
school is 0.15 These are independent events.
a .Work out the probability that

i. they are both late for school

ii . Arun is late but Marcus is not

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iii . Marcus is late but Arun is not

iv. neither of them is late for school

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