What is the mode?
The mode is not in the primary curriculum (it is taught in Key Stage 3), but some 11+ papers include it. Below: what it means, a worked example, the mistake to watch for and an 11+ question.
The answer
The mode is the number, or thing, that appears most often in a set.
What it means
A set can have one mode, more than one, or none at all if there are two or more different values and they all appear equally often.
The mode works for things that are not numbers too, like the most popular colour in a class survey.
A worked example
Find the mode of 4, 6, 6, 7, 9, 6 and 4
- Count each value: 4 appears twice, 6 three times, 7 once, 9 once.
- 6 appears most often, so the mode is 6.
The common mistake
Giving how many times it appears instead of the value. In the example the mode is 6, not 3.
How it comes up in the 11+
The shoe sizes in a group are 4, 5, 3, 5, 4, 6, 5 and 2. What is the mode?
Answer: 5
- Count each size: 2 once, 3 once, 4 twice, 5 three times, 6 once.
- Size 5 appears most often, so the mode is 5.
Try it yourself
It opens on 4, 6, 6, 7, 9, 6 and 4 from the worked example: see which number appears most often.
Type a list of numbers to see the mean, median, mode and range, each with its working.
Related words and practice
More maths words
Questions parents ask
Can there be more than one mode?
Yes. In 2, 2, 5, 7, 7 both 2 and 7 appear twice, so there are two modes.
Can the mode be a word?
Yes. If most children in a class say blue is their favourite colour, the mode is blue.
Knowing the words is half of an 11+ maths question
11+ papers use maths vocabulary without explaining it. The free diagnostic checks maths, English and both kinds of reasoning, and shows what to practise next. No card is required.