Does the median have to be arranged from least to greatest?

The most common definition of the median is that given a set of data values it is the middle value of the data set when it has been arranged in ascending order.

So, while the median is the number in the middle of a data set. Sometimes there is no single number in the middle in which case we take the mean of the two middle numbers.

Weather you order the values from smallest to largest or largest to smallest, the middle will still be the same, in spite of the common definition using ascending order.

For example

1,2,5,6,8 The median is 5. If I write those numbers are 8,6,5,2,1 the 5 is still the middle number in the set.

With an even number of data values, such as 1,2,4,6,8,11, the median is the mean of 4 and 6 which is 5. If I write that set from largest to smallest the median is the same.

So the median is the middlemost number. In most math classes, students are told to arrange the numbers from smallest to largest, however, you can see that this really makes no difference.