Creating a Scatter Plot

 

Hit “Stat” key and select “Edit” option.

 

Clear each list by arrowing up to “L1” and hitting the “Clear” key and the hitting the down arrow.  Repeat for all filled lists.

 

Enter the x-values for your points into L1, and the y-values into L2.  Make sure there are an equal number of items in each list.

 

To graph the points, hit the “2nd” key followed by the “Y=” key.  This gets you to “Stat Plot”.

 

Arrow down to “1:” and hit “Enter” key.  The “Plot 1” screen should now appear. 

 

Highlight “On” by placing the flashing cursor over “On” and then hitting “Enter”. 

 

Move down to the “Type:” option.  Place the flashing cursor over the 1st option of six (scatter plot, located upper left) and hit “Enter”.

 

Set the “X-list” to “L1” and “Y-list” to “L2”.  The “list” options are “2nd” choices located above the numbers 1 – 6.

 

Select the type of “Mark:” that you want to appear in your scatter plot graph.  One of the first two is preferred. 

 

Hit the “Window” button along the top row and set max and min values to ones that are appropriate for the data sets being used.  A “square” window will use an x:y ratio of 3:2.  It may not be possible to use a square window for every set of data.

 

Hit the “Graph” button along the top row and your scatter plot graph should appear on the screen.

Identifying the Best-Fit Line

 

Hit the “Stat” key.  The Stat menu should appear automatically.

 

Arrow over to “Calc”. The Calc menu should appear automatically. 

 

Look back at the scatter plot.  What type of figure or graph would best represent the set of points in the plot?  Since the data appears to be linear in this case, we want to use linear regression.

 

Reenter the “Calc” menu.

 

Hit the “4” key and “LinReg (ax+b)” should appear automatically.

 

Hit the “2nd” key and then the “Stat” key.  The “List” screen should appear automatically.  Hit the “1” key and “L1”, should appear immediately after “LinReg (ax+b)”.

 

Insert a comma following “L1”, the button located just above “7”.

 

Hit the “2nd” key and then the “Stat” key.  The “List” screen should appear automatically.  Hit the “2” key and “L2”, should appear on the 2nd row below “LinReg (ax+b)  L1,”.

 

Hit the “Enter” key and the pertinent information for a linear equation will appear on the screen:

y=ax+b

a = slope

b = y-intercept

 

To check this answer, hit the “Y=” key.  After clearing all previously entered equations, highlight “Y1=”. 

 

Hit the “Vars” key followed by the “5” key.  Arrow over to the “EQ” option and then hit the “1” key.  The calculated linear regression equation should now be automatically entered after “Y1=“.