Will anyone get their own hat back?
A class mixes its hats, then each kid gets one without looking. Will anyone end up with the hat they brought?
Mixing changes places—not hats
Nothing is copied or lost. To spot a return later, we must remember which hat started with which kid.
A match means owner meets own hat
move every hatowners lined up
beforeone full handout
This sample can teach “match.” It cannot tell us what usually happens.
One own hat among the whole pile
group size1 in 5
2 kids12 kids
For one chosen kid, the own-hat chance is 1 out of the group size.
Different handouts, different counts
three fair sample dealsthree samples waiting
A few examples show what can happen—not what happens most.
Three equal buckets wait
Keep only eight-kid handouts with at least one match. The checker will sort every one by its match count.
exactly 1
exactly 2
3 or more
No sample gets a vote here. Every possible handout gets checked.
Every successful handout goes into one match-count bucket.
The checker keeps only successful 8-kid handouts. Which bucket will finish tallest?
Slide through every successful eight-kid handout.
exact checkernone checked yet
none checkedall checked
