Mathematics

School Based Assessment

Year of Examination: 2023

Subject:Mathematics
Candidate Number:
Candidate Name: Elijah Kevy David
Project Title: The assessment of the fairness of a coin toss using experiments and
mathematical principles.
Teacher: Amina Toussaint
 Table of Contents

Topic Page

Project Title…………………………………………………… 1
Acknowledgement…………………………………………… 2
Purpose of Project/Problem Statement………………… ………… 3
Introduction…………………………………………………………. 4
Method of Data Collection………………………………………….. 5
Presentation of Data………………………………………………… 6
Interpretation/Analysis of Data…………………………………….. 9
Conclusion…………………………………………………………… 10
Bibliography………………………………………………………….. 11
 Project Title
The assessment of the fairness of a coin toss using experiments and mathematical
principles.

Acknowledgement

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I would like to acknowledge and give my warmest thanks to my Math teacher, Miss
Toussaint for her guidance, advice and feedback . A special thanks to my aunt and my
mom for their continuous support and understanding. Thanks to God for His guidance.

Purpose of project and problem statement

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A football match between France and Argentina was about to take place. To determine who got
the ball first, the referees opted for a coin toss. However, Karim, a player on the French team
objected to the idea because he held the belief that the coin always lands on the bottom side.
Furthermore, he believed that the coin will most likely land on the side it’s flipped. After
reviewing this dilemma, the researcher decided to conduct a survey to test his theory.

Introduction

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This project is centred on using mathematical ideas, methods, and techniques to comprehend,
characterise, or justify a real-world occurrence. The project is an experiment that entails data
gathering.
Probability is a way to gauge how likely something is to happen. Several things are difficult to
forecast with absolute confidence. Using it, we can only make predictions about the likelihood of
an event happening, or how likely it is. Probability can range from 0 to 1, with 0 denoting an
impossibility and 1 denoting a certainty. The probability of all the events in a sample space adds
up to 1. For example, when we toss a coin, either we get Head OR Tail, only two outcomes are
possible (H, T).

Method of Data Collection

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An experiment was carried out using a twenty-five cent coin. The coin was tossed 50 times under
each of the following circumstances. This was done to demonstrate how fair it was to use the
coin toss method.

Situations:
1. Shake the coin in a paper bag for some time before throwing it on the grass.
2. Shake the coin in cupped hands for some time before throwing it on the grass.
3. Shake the coin in a paper bag for some time before throwing it on the wooden floor.
4. Shake the coin in cupped hands for some time before throwing it on the wooden floor.
5. Shake the coin in a paper bag for some time before throwing it on the tiled floor.
6. Shake the coin in cupped hands for some time before throwing it on the tiled floor .

After the trial, the frequencies of the number of landings uppermost were noted in a table. The
amount of times the coin was shaken before it was tossed was not predetermined, and the
experimenter did not attempt to throw the coin in any particular way in an effort to minimise
bias.

Presentation of Data

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 Symbol Frequencies Total
Frequencies
Situation Situation Situation Situation 4 Situation Situation
1 2 3 5 6

Heads 28 25 20 23 24 28 148

Tails 22 25 30 27 26 22 152

Table 1:Frequencies of the uppermost landing that took place during the experiment

Figure 1: Pie Chart-Total Frequency comparison between heads and tails landing during
the experiment.

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Figure 2: Comparative Bar chart showing the comparison between the heads and tails
landing during the experiment

Situation 1 2 3 4 5 6

Relative 28/50=0.56 25/50=0.5 20/50=0.4 23/50=0.46 20/50=0.4 28/50=0.56

Probability

Theoretical ½=0.5 ½=0.5 ½=0.5 ½=0.5 ½=0.5 ½=0.5

Probability

Table 2: Probability of the heads landing uppermost in the experiment that was carried out
and also the theoretical probability

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 Situation 1 2 3 4 5 6

Relative 22/50=0.44 25/50=0.5 30/50=0.6 27/50=0.54 30/50=0.6 22/50=0.44

Probability

Theoretical ½=0.5 ½=0.5 ½=0.5 ½=0.5 ½=0.5 ½=0.5

Probability

Table 3: Probability of the tails landing uppermost in the experiment that was carried out
and also the theoretical probability

Interpretation and Analysis of Data

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The comparative bar chart shows the comparisons between a coin landing on its head and tail
under varying situations. For each of the situations, the coin was dropped 50 times. For all of the
situations, the frequencies range from 20 to 30. In situations 1 and 6, the frequency of the coin
landing on its head is higher while frequency of the coin landing on its tail is higher in situations
3,4 and 5. For situation 6, the frequency of the coin landing on its head and tail is the same. It is
interesting to note that the differences in frequencies for all situations are not that significant.
The changes are small except in situation 3 where there is a difference of ten which favours tail.

The bar chart shows the total frequency of the coin landing on heads and tails in all the different
situations. The frequency of the coin landing on tails was higher (152) than heads (148). This
was a difference of 2% (51% to 49%).

In situations 1 and 6, the relative probability of heads landing uppermost in the experiment
differs slightly from the theoretical probability. The difference is minus 0.06. For situations 3, 4
and 5, it differs by +1, +0.04 and +0.1 respectively. For situation 2, there is no difference. This
means that both the relative and theoretical probability are the same. For all situations, the
difference between the relative and theoretical probability are very insignificant, meaning that it
is not high enough to show bias and unfairness. It disproves Karim’s belief that the coin always
lands on the bottom side as it shows a fair chance of the coin landing on both sides.

Conclusion

An analysis of the results show that the relative probability of the coin landing on heads and tails
was relatively close. For each of the different situations, the difference between relative and

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theoretical probability was not significant enough to show bias and unfairness. The experiment
disproved Karim’s belief that the coin always lands on the bottom. When tossing a coin, the
chance of the coin landing on the head or the tail is the same: 50%. To increase the fairness of
the coin toss, the number of times the coin is tossed should be increased. The more the coin is
tossed, the chance of it landing on heads and tails will be approximately equal. The football
officials can increase the coin toss to at least five tosses to increase its fairness.

Bibliography

Khan, Shereen & Ali, Fayad. (2018). The Complete Study Guide for CSEC Mathematics.

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Probability: The basics (article) (no date) Khan Academy. Khan Academy. Available at:
https://www.khanacademy.org/math/statistics-probability/probability-library/basic-theoretical-
probability/a/probability-the-basics (Accessed: February 16, 2023).

Admin (2022) Probability in maths - definition, formula, types, problems and solutions, BYJUS.
BYJU'S. Available at: https://byjus.com/maths/probability/#:~:text=Probability%20means
%20possibility.,likely%20events%20are%20to%20happen. (Accessed: February 19, 2023).

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