Math Help for 4th Grade: Making a Table

Help with Math Tables

Reading Tables

The key to understanding a chart or table is to read the labels, which are often found at the top of the table. Here, you will see the units of measurement. Usually, there is some kind of interaction between the headings on two sides of the chart or table.

For example, the left side might read 'price in dollars' and the right side might be labeled 'books.' These headings tell you that there is a relationship between the price of the book and the types of books.

Creating Your Own

Make your own inches-to-feet conversion chart on a piece of notebook paper. Draw two neat columns in a box, and write 'inches' and the top of one and 'feet' at the top of the other. In the 'feet' column, write the numbers 1-10. Then, in the 'inches' column, convert the feet to inches by multiplying by 12. For instance, the first column should read 12 inches, since that is the equivalent to one foot. You can now use this chart to quickly and easily convert feet to inches or inches to feet.

You can make tables for just about anything. For example, create a table to compare the amount of students in your class that prefer cake or pie. Set up your two columns, interview every student in your class and then record the numbers. The graph will allow you to easily compare the two amounts.

Additional Charts and Graphs

Graphs are used to visually represent information. Often, after creating a table, you will then make a graph to represent that information. Two kinds that you may work with this year are pie charts and bar graphs. A pie chart is a circle divided into sections, like pizza slices of different sizes. With bar graphs, you use vertical lines to represent the relationship between two amounts.

Using our cake and pie example from above, you could visually represent the information by making a bar graph. Begin by drawing vertical and horizontal lines that intersect. Label the vertical line 'number of students', and the horizontal line 'type of dessert'.

Now, let's say that 13 students preferred cake, and 11 preferred pie. Use a blue marker to represent the number of students who liked cake. Draw a vertical line all the way up to the number 13. Then, use a green marker to represent the amount that liked pie. Draw a vertical line all the way up to the number 11.