284 STATISTICS •^ BLOCK GRAPHS
This tally chart shows the results
of a survey that asked children
which fruit they liked best. Let’s use
the data to make a block graph.
Each tally mark shows that
one child chose that fruit.
We draw a square block
on our graph for every
tally mark on the chart. All the
blocks must be the same size.
We stack the blocks on
top of each other in
columns. Leave gaps between
the columns. The number of
blocks in a column shows how
many times that fruit was
chosen (the frequency).
Block graphs
A block graph is a kind of graph in which one block, usually
a square, is used to represent one member of a group or
set of data. The blocks are stacked in columns.
Each block tells you that
one child chose that fruit
Give your block
graph a title
Five children
preferred
bananas
Grapes were the
most popular fruit
Leave gaps
between
columns
Most popular fruit
Orange
TYPE OF FRUIT
Apple Grapes Watermelon Banana
Orange
Apple
Grapes
Watermelon
Banana
Six children
preferred apples
Tally marks record
frequency of the data
Which fruit do you prefer?
Block graphs show
data as stacks of
square blocks.
284_285_Block_bar_charts.indd 284 29/02/2016 18:06