| Statistical Programs |
| College of Agriculture | University of Idaho |
| Seminar Announcement |
| "Applied Statistics in Agriculture" |
|
Bridging the Gap Between Students and Statistics:
Cognition, Affect, and the Role of Teaching Method Presented By |
| Dr. William T. Mickelson |
|
Division of Statistics University of Idaho |
| Tuesday, February 25 3:30 P. M. Ag. Science 62 |
|
Traditionally, the introductory statistics course has been one
of the most hated and feared courses on campuses across the
country. Simon and Bruce (1991) lament, "probability and
statistics continues to be the bane of students, most of whom
consider the statistics course a painful rite of passage --
like fraternity paddling -- on the way to an academic degree..."
Over the past 30 years, there has been an increase in the
professional literature on how to teach statistics
with a continuous call for reform of the introductory
statistics course. Virtually every American Statistical
Association (ASA) president, in the past 10 years, has
addressed the topic of statistics education as a key issue
effecting the status and image of statistics as a profession.
It is rather interesting that, while many have examined the practice of teaching statistics, very little is known about how students learn statistical concepts and reasoning skills. In addition to presenting a review of the literature on what is known about how students learn statistics and an overview of the suggested classroom reforms, this talk begins to examine the extreme gap that clearly exists between the introductory student and the subject matter of the introductory statistics course. A model, grounded in the constructivist theory of learning and developed from classroom observations, performance data, student writings, and interviews will be presented. This model attempts to relate teaching method and student factors (cognition, meta-cognition, affect, personal) with conceptual understanding of statistical ideas and reasoning. Details of an ongoing quasi-experiment designed to systematically investigate these relationships will also be discussed. All interested faculty, staff, and graduate students are invited to attend. |
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