Rich internet applications are becoming more popular in the statistics community as a means to create expressive visual displays of complex data sets thereby improving the accessibility and understanding of these data. Also, they make good complements to our instructional applets and course materials. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:15:34-07:00 2009-05-28 Department of Statistics false 5:00 PM 326 5128 Math Sciences Bldg. UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Juana Sanchez 4:00 PM 2009-06-19T18:35:17-07:00 NA Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:16:45-07:00 2009-05-07 Department of Statistics false 5:00 PM 327 5128 Math Sciences Bldg. UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Mark Hansen 4:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 NA Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:18:10-07:00 2009-04-23 Department of Statistics false 5:00 PM 328 5128 Math Sciences Bldg. UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar David Diez 4:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 StatCrunch has traditionally been a Web based software package for analyzing data. However, recent updates to the statcrunch.com site have now opened the door for online social data analysis in a way that can have tremendous impacts on statistical education. This talk will cover basic usage of the powerful StatCrunch statistical software package as well as methods for optimizing the usage of the statcrunch.com site in your course. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:19:01-07:00 2009-04-16 Department of Statistics false 5:00 PM 329 5128 Math Sciences Bldg. Texas A&M University false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Webster West 4:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 NA Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:20:33-07:00 2009-04-02 Department of Statistics false 5:00 PM 331 5128 Math Sciences Bldg. UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Robert Gould 4:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 I will describe my experience writing and teaching from SticiGui, an online set of materials for teaching Statistics. These materials are comprised of 186 XHTML files containing about 108,000 lines of XHTML and JavaScript, 65 Java classes containing about 16,000 lines of code, 16 JavaScript libraries containing about 5,000 lines of code, 34 data files containing about 5,000 records, a cascading style sheet with about 400 lines, and a handful of .jpg and .gif files. I use the materials to teach introductory classes, including Berkeley's first online course. Using XHTML with Java, JavaScript and CSS allowed me to make the content dynamic: many examples and exercises change whenever the page is reloaded, so students can get unlimited practice at certain kinds of problems. Each student gets a different version of each assignment, but can see the solutions to his/her version after the due date. Automation makes it easy to use mastery-based assessment: students can submit each assignment up to 5 times. Only the last submission counts. A student has to get a score of 85% or higher to ""pass"" the assignment, with a bonus for scoring 100%. This helps assignments function better as learning tools instead of just yardsticks. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:22:41-07:00 2008-05-29 Department of Statistics false 5:00 PM 332 5137 Math Sciences Bldg. UC Berkeley false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Phil Stark 4:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 The major objective in developing AEGSS is to enhance statistical literacy and statistical thinking through making it possible for the students to generate their own answers to open-ended questions rather than choose answers to multiple-choice questions. The algorithms involved in the development of "AEGSS" will be discussed and a demonstration of the prototype will be made. The results and overall accuracy that was obtained on a sample of essays will be discussed. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:24:02-07:00 2008-05-15 Department of Statistics false 5:00 PM 333 5137 Math Sciences Bldg. UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Mahtash Esfandiari and Hai Nguyen 4:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 Education reforms in the last fifteen years have enlivened the teaching of introductory statistics with fewer lectures and more active learning, fewer recipes and more conceptual thinking, fewer contrivances and more real data. However, bringing these reforms to large multi-section introductory courses has been a difficult challenge. Thus, the buffet model was developed at The Ohio State University to use class size as a strength rather than a weakness, to optimize learning for the individual rather than norming for the group, and to integrate technology as an efficient tool rather than an expensive add-on. Students learn in different ways so, in the buffet model, different course sections are geared toward different learning styles and students are offered a choice of interchangeable paths to learn the same course objectives. In order to promote student commitment to follow through on their choices and to enable efficient tracking of each student's progress through the course, the choice of learning modes is exercised through an on-line "contract" entered into by students at the beginning of the quarter. Students can make an informed choice based on the results of their own learning styles inventory and by reading testimony from previous students most like themselves. The buffet structure has been successful in increasing both student satisfaction and student learning. For example, scores on common exams have increased by about a half-letter grade while dropouts and students needing to retake this required course have decreased by about 40%. Finally, key elements of the buffet strategy can also be adapted to smaller classes to improve student learning. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:28:12-07:00 2008-05-01 Department of Statistics false 5:00 PM 334 5137 Math Sciences Bldg. Ohio State University false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Dennis Pearl 4:00 PM 2009-06-18T08:24:01-07:00 Sophisticated statistical tools have made data analysis accessible to an increasingly wide variety of people, from scientists to students, demographers to historians. Yet, statistics is still generally regarded as a difficult — if not impossible — topic to understand. How can the powerful technology used for statistical analysis be harnessed to support students' understanding of statistical concepts? At least two projects in the last decade have taken on this challenge and designed educational environments that are both a tool that can carry out statistical analyses and a tool box with which budding analysts can try out and compare a variety of approaches to a statistical situation. I will discuss one of these, TinkerPlots, a statistics education tool that can be used as early as middle school and at least through high school. While I will describe the educational model that TinkerPlots is based on and demonstrate some of its features, I will focus in particular on the ways in which the software acts as a learning context and share several examples of students and teachers exploring statistical concepts using the TinkerPlots tool box. Bio: Andee Rubin, Senior Scientist at TERC, has done research and development in the fields of mathematics, technology, and online learning for over 25 years. She has written curriculum, developed and provided professional development, and designed software and accompanying activities as well as studying how students and teachers develop mathematical reasoning skills. Her research has focused on how students and teachers develop statistical reasoning, how video can be used to introduce ideas of movement over time to middle school students, and how mathematics education can be integrated into informal settings such as zoos, aquariums, and science centers. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:32:57-07:00 2008-04-24 Learning Research false 5:00 PM 335 5137 Math Sciences Bldg. TERC false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Andee Rubin 4:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 The increased emphasis over the past decade on learning and teaching in universities has been both general and discipline-based. Although this sometimes causes tensions, it is important for disciplines to be pro-active in analysing, developing and proclaiming the pedagogical aspects of their disciplines, including points of agreement and disagreement with the general higher education literature and viewpoints. For example, calls for tertiary educators to assess what they value, to identify learning objectives, and to align assessment with objectives, appear in both general and discipline-specific higher education literature emphasizing the role of assessment in learning. However, in the nexus between principles and practice in tertiary assessment in statistics and mathematics, the variety and extent of demands and pressures on assessment packages can sometimes appear overwhelming and even contradictory. Amidst the balancing of formative, summative, flexible, continuous, rich and authentic assessment with demands for criteria and standards-referenced assessment, and developing generic graduate capabilities such as teamwork, problem-solving and communication skills, lurk the problems of over-assessment and the politics of pass rates and attrition. The many dimensions of the assessment challenge are complicated in introductory statistics and mathematics courses by the diversity of student cohorts in which the wide range of backgrounds, programs, motivations and study skills need consideration in designing appropriate assessment and learning packages. This presentation discusses issues, challenges, successful and less successful strategies in designing and implementing integrated assessment and learning packages in statistics and mathematics particularly in early undergraduate years for both service and core courses. The vexatious questions of plagiarism, cooperative and group work are included. Examples are given in both statistics and mathematics, and similarities and contrasts with general higher education pedagogies are highlighted. Bio: Helen MacGillivray is a Professor in the Queensland University of Technology's School of Mathematical Sciences, and Director of its Maths Access Centre. She has taught statistics and lead statistics teaching across all levels, class sizes and many disciplines. She has written or presented over 30 national and international papers in learning and teaching, and held more than 10 national or university teaching grants, most recently a National Leadership Award and a National Senior Fellowship. She has also played key roles over 15 years in school syllabi, resource development and teacher support across all levels of schooling. Helen was the first female President, and the first female Honorary Life Member, of the Statistical Society of Australia Inc (SSAI). She has also been President of the Australian Mathematical Sciences Council and is now president-elect of the IASE. She is currently chair of the IASE strand of the 2009 Session of the International Statistics Institute, and scientific coordinator of the IASE's 8th International Conference on Teaching Statistics, 2010, and is Australian representative on the editorial board of the journal 'Teaching Statistics'. Her current statistical research interests are in the development and application of new distributional families of particular interest in the financial world. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:36:26-07:00 2008-04-10 School of Mathematical Sciences false 5:00 PM 336 5137 Math Sciences Bldg. Queensland University of Technology, Australia false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Helen MacGillvray 4:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 We will discuss the new SOCR developments, tools and activities designed in the past year. This includes the new interactive SOCR resource viewer, activities, distributions, charts, etc. In addition, we'll discuss the future SOCR expansions, integration with UCLA undergraduate statistics curriculum and Moodle. Finally, we'll have a hands-on training session on how to use and expand the SOCR resources. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:37:39-07:00 2007-06-01 Department of Statistics false 5:00 PM 337 9413 Boelter Hall UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Ivo Dinov 4:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 This talk is addressed to teachers of Mathematics across the school curriculum (K-12) that will introduce in their classes reasoning with data and chance according to the most recent guidelines of the NCTM, GAISE and College Board Guidelines in 2006. It will show how to make the best use of what is already there in the CensusAtSchool International Project (http://www.censusatschool.ntu.ac.uk/) to prepare activities for the classroom and to involve students in thinking and reasoning about data and chance with minimum effort while learning about other children in the world. The experience of the 5 participating countries (Australia, New Zealand, Canada, United Kingdom and South Africa) will be summarized with video clips. The talk will also explain how teachers in California can get their class involved in the new phase of this International project at no cost, if they wish. The National Council of Teacher of Mathematics (2006) includes CensusAtSchool as an example of one of the ways to introduce the new guidelines across the curriculum, and that article will be handed out with permission of the authors at the seminar. Other promotional material from CensusAtSchool in the participating countries will be distributed at the seminar. The talk will probably be videotaped. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:39:18-07:00 2007-05-25 Administration false 5:00 PM 338 9413 Boelter Hall International Statistical Literacy Project false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Juana Sanchez 4:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 We started working on the statistics ""blended instruction"" cases study that has been funded by the College of Letters and Science in 2004. With the help of the OID our department chose a ""collaborative learning system"" called Moodle. Jose Garcia and the Graduate Student Researchers funded by this project have conducted extensive work on how to use Moodle successfully and effectively for teaching multiple sections of classes with high enrollment (100 or more students). We have been using Moodle for teaching the restructured Statistics 10 since January 2005 and presently Moodle is being used in as many as 22 lower division, upper division, and graduate courses in our department. The areas in which we have successfully used Moodle include: 1) Maintaining a responsive system that is available twenty four hours a day so that the students can access it successfully and productively at any given time, 2) updating Moodle successfully from version1.4 in 2005 to 1.7 today, 3) development of an automated test bank which includes one thousand multiple-choice questions most of which are written at the upper thinking level, 4) Organizing the test bank so that each instructor has access to the common pool of items as well as the items in their own personal files that are not open to others, 5) Classification of the items according to the major statistical concepts and strategies, 6) Editing the items in the test bank and ascertaining that they are statistically sound, 7) using Moodle to calculate the item difficulty (percentage of correct answers) of the items that have been used in the quizzes since 2005, and 8) using Moodle to include more graphics in the quizzes. The challenges that remain include: 1) Using Moodle for other types of questions including short answers, randomly generated questions, and questions with numerical answers, 2) Creating the possibility of developing parallel quizzes and exams by developing the ability to post the difficulty of each item next to its title, 2) Using Moodle for grading open-ended questions. At this point we are using Moodle to have the students respond to open-ended questions. But, these responses need to be graded manually. Our objective is to select and train an automated essay grading software (AEG) that would help us in this regard. Based on Garcia's suggestion we need to work toward writing our own module to make this happen. In the mean time in order to train the software of our choice to automatically grade short open-ended questions, we need to work on developing open-ended questions with the relevant rubrics. We have already started working on this and we hope to accomplish this goal by the next couple of years. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:42:04-07:00 2007-05-11 Department of Statistics false 5:00 PM 339 9413 Boelter Hall UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Mahtash Esfandiari, Hai Nguyen and Jose Garcia 4:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 In the fall semester 2000 we implemented a restructured intro course in statistics. The 'old' course was 'traditional' (in terms of pre-2000 instructional models). The new course transfers responsibility for learning to the student. It has 3/4 sections (60-80 students/section) that meet twice a week in computer labs and twice in lecture (240-320 students). Students are given reading assignments and homework to do prior to class. They are given 'Readiness Assessment Quizzes' in labs on 'modules of topics', some that have been discussed in class and others not covered previously. The two large meetings are devoted to overviews of topics and/or small and large group activities. The labs focus on individual and group work on activities designed to enhance skills in analyzing and interpreting data. The impact on enrollments and instructional costs has been immense. Some issues I will address include a) value of lecturing, b) frequent assessment, and c) value of group projects on grades. I will discuss our experience with this revamped course and an assessment of student performance. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:42:59-07:00 2007-05-04 Department of Statistics false 5:00 PM 340 9413 Boelter Hall Penn State University false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar William Harkness 4:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 When we added a lab component to Stats 10, we hoped that it would increase student understanding and allow students to explore larger data sets in context. In our session we consider several concerns: * How do the Fathom labs complement the instruction in Statistics 10? * How do Statistics 10 students react to the Fathom labs? * What do two specific Fathom labs ask students to do? * How can we improve the lab component in Statistics 10? Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:44:28-07:00 2007-04-20 Department of Statistics false 5:00 PM 341 9413 Boelter Hall UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Gretchen Davis 4:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 The aim of my talk is to present you the results achieved and the experience gained in designing an implementing e-status (http://ka.upc.es), a web-based tool to improve students performance in statistics and the formal randomized evaluation of its effects. This talk is an updated version of the work developed together with my colleagues, presented in ICOTS7 (Gonzalez et al., 2006) and the recently published paper in CAEE (Gonzalez and Munoz, 2006) e-status is a tool developed mixing together the main working lines in stats education: Learning by practicing and Problem Solving, to which the feedback knowledge of students improvement has been added. The tool is complementary to classical learning materials used: practical sessions at the computer lab and lecture-based instruction. This talk is co-sponsored by the UCLA SOCR project. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-09T22:45:44-07:00 2006-11-21 Department of Statistics false 4:00 PM 342 6627 Math Sciences Bldg. North Carolina State University false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Pilar Munoz 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 In this presentation we will discuss: 1. The preliminary findings of an exploratory study on teaching statistics in the community colleges within the Los Angeles County. This will include examination of typical syllabi for introductory statistics, statistic textbook used by 80% - 90% of the community colleges, and student assessment. 2. Guidelines provided by the American Statistical Association for teaching introductory statistics (GAISE) and the extent to which the community college instructors are familiar with them. 3. Summary of one-on-one interviews conducted with a number of community college statistics instructors within the Los Angeles County. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-13T21:49:04-07:00 2006-06-01 Department of Statisitics false 4:00 PM 343 5127 Math Sciences Bldg. UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Jackie Dacosta and Mahtash Esfandiari 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 With increasing college enrollments and availability of technology, many campuses are investigating the use of online instruction. In the Fall of 2001, as part of a larger study at the University of California, Davis, we conducted an experiment to compare a "hybrid" offering with a traditional offering of our large introductory statistics course. For the hybrid offering the class met once a week for evaluation and an overview, but the students were required to learn the material using web-based material (CyberStats) and a textbook. We examined differences in student performance, student satisfaction and investment of both student and instructor time for the hybrid and traditional classes. The hybrid course was taught again in Fall 2002, modified based on the study results, but still wasn't quite right. A more successful approach was used in Fall 2003 and 2004. This talk will discuss the results of the study, changes in the course since then, and recommendations in the context of Garfield's (1995) principles of learning statistics. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T10:00:37-07:00 2006-05-25 Department of Statistics false 4:00 PM 344 5127 Math Sciences Bldg. UC Davis false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Jessica Utts 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 Although the Statistics Education community has advocated using real data to teach introductory statistics for quite some time, often these data sets are not recognizably real to statisticians since the students' limited experience with "real" statistical software and data management techniques precludes the use of truly messy data. But grappling with messy and complex data sets is important for teaching Statistical Thinking (broadly defined as "thinking like a statistician") and is appropriate for an introductory statistics course. We describe our experience collecting rich data sets and developing computer lab assignments using STATA to teach statistical thinking to first-year university students using these data sets. Collecting useable, real, data sets turns out to be fairly difficult for several reasons, and teaching data management and analysis without resorting to rote-based rules is quite challenging. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T10:02:22-07:00 2006-05-18 Statistics, Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Science, Joint Program in Survey Methodology false 4:00 PM 345 5127 Math Sciences Bldg. UCLA, University of Maryland false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Robert Gould (UCLA), Frauke Kreuter (JPSM), and Christina Palmer (UCLA) 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 In May 2005, ASA endorsed guidelines for instruction in statistics education at the PreK-12 level and the college introductory course. These guidelines were developed by a group of leading statistics and mathematics educators. The foundation for the PreK-12 framework rests on the NCTM Standards. The PreK-12 document provides guidance on the content that should be taught in the elementary, middle and high school grades, focusing on a connected curriculum that will allow a high school graduate to have a working knowledge and appreciation for the basic ideas of statistics. The college document focuses on recommendations for the introductory course that promote conceptual understanding and the attainment of statistical literacy and thinking. Both documents have the same ultimate goal: developing a statistically literate citizen. An overview of the documents along with short examples of moving statistical concepts across developments levels will be presented. Issues associated with the implementation of the recommendations will also be discussed. Bio-sketch: Christine Franklin is a Lecturer and Honors Professor in the Department of Statistics at the University of Georgia. She has been actively involved at the national level with promoting statistical education at the Pre K-12 level since the early 1990's. Her involvement with the AP Statistics program includes preparing teachers since 1995 to teach AP Statistics and serving as a table and question leader at the AP Statistics readings. She also conducts College Board workshops and in 1998, began teaching a new course at UGA that she designed for secondary math teachers. She has also developed a new master's level course in probability and statistics for 6-8 teachers and is currently developing a new course for Pre K-5 teachers. Chris has served on the ASA Advisory Committee for Teacher Enhancement since 2000 and served as chair of the steering committee that planned the ASA sponsored inaugural conference in statistics for teacher educators (TEAMS) that was held in October 2003. She is an associate editor for the Journal of Statistics Education. She chaired the ASA project, GAISE, for developing Pre K-12 guidelines in statistical education. She is the 2006 chair of the ASA Section on Statistical Education and is a Fellow of ASA. Chris has been honored with numerous teaching and advising awards at the University of Georgia. Chris has also written numerous publications for textbooks and educational journals. A recent project was writing for the NCTM Navigation Series where she is one of four authors for the 9-12 Data Analysis book. She is the co-author along with Alan Agresti of an introductory college level statistics textbook for Prentice Hall, published in January 2006. Chris served as an advisor to the GA mathematics committee that recently revised the Georgia Pre K-12 mathematics standards. The GAISE Framework was an instrumental part with infusing more data analysis into the new GA Performance Standards. Chris has two boys, Corey who graduates from high school in May, and Cody, a rising 6th grader. She loves to run, hike and backpack, play the piano, play softball, read, and attend basketball and baseball games. She hates to cook but loves to eat. But most of all, she enjoys spending time with her husband and boys. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T10:04:15-07:00 2006-05-11 Department of Statistics false 4:00 PM 346 5127 Math Sciences Bldg. University of Georgia false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Christine Franklin 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 As the rate of enrollment in the undergraduate classes increases, the College of Letters and Science is looking into blended instruction, combining the regular methods of teaching and technology, as a mean of enhancing the quality of teaching, learning, and assessment. Last year we presented a pilot study that related to using blended instruction in teaching introductory statistics to a class that consisted of 32 students. The results indicated that the pilot was successful and we had reached the major goals of the restructured Statistics 10 including helping students generate their own knowledge, enhancing upper level thinking, introducing statistics as a science of data, and creating an interactive environment that enhanced student-student, student-TA, and student-instructor interaction. In this presentation, we will discuss the conclusions that have resulted from an experimental study that was designed to examine the effectiveness of blended instruction on teaching introductory statistics to classes of 100 students. This will include quantitative results regarding the comparison of the control (old Stat 10) and the experimental group (restructured Stat 10) on acquisition of knowledge, attitudes examined in the pilot study, as well as qualitative results covering student comments, teaching assistant comments, and classroom observations. In addition to positive finding with respect to the acquisition of statistical knowledge, the positive attitudinal results that are in synch with what was reported last year will be discussed. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-01T20:28:25-07:00 2006-05-09 Department of Statistics false 4:00 PM 90 6627 Math Sciences Bldg. UCLA false true UCLA Department of Statistics Seminar Mahtash Esfandiari, Chris Barr, Adam Sugano 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 Using topics ranging from "mean and median" to "sampling distributions" the lead developer of Fathom Dynamic Data Software illustrates how considerations of learning and teaching statistics influence the software design process. Bio: Bill is Senior Scientist at KCP Technologies where he leads the Fathom Dynamic Data™ Software development team. His experience includes software development, curriculum development, research into programming tools, teacher professional development, classroom teaching, and research on learning statistics. He has been principal investigator of several NSF/SBIR funded projects, most recently "Census Microdata in the Mathematics Classroom." Prior to working at KCP Technologies, he served as Educational Technology Director at Key Curriculum Press where, in addition to starting the Fathom project, he conducted research and development of materials to support implementation of The Geometer's Sketchpad and led the NSF/SBIR-supported effort to start a professional development center. Bill's experience as a software developer began in 1978 at San Francisco State University working with Diane Resek to create curriculum and computer environments for Statistics without Fear, Computers without Fear, and Computers in the Classroom. With Resek, he co-authored the Mirrors on the Mind software series and was co-PI of the Math Worlds project and the Computer Curriculum Cadre project. His research with Laura Gould at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center culminated in the development of a Smalltalk-based authoring environment called Programming by Rehearsal. At the Lawrence Hall of Science in Berkeley, he led the team that developed DataRelator, an early hypertext relational database. Bill's current interests center on developing software and curriculum to prepare students and teachers to make intelligent use of the data deluging our society. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T10:54:11-07:00 2006-05-04 Development false 4:00 PM 347 5127 Math Sciences Bldg. Key Curriculum Press false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Bill Finzer 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 Teachers of statistics make frequent decisions about how to best use technology and how to best teach technology. The UCLA Department of Statistics is about to launch the first journal to publish research intended to help the statistics education make data-based decisions on technology choices. Currently, the leading U.S. journal of statistics education is the ASA's Journal of Statistics Education (JSE). We therefore examine the JSE to see how it addresses the "technology issue". We apply a multi-dimensional scaling technique to create a "map" of the content of the JSE, and in this talk will explore this map and its variations to better understand how our new journal might address these issues. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T10:56:39-07:00 2006-04-20 Department of Statistics false 4:00 PM 348 5127 Math Sciences Bldg. UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Nathan Yau and Robert Gould 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 I will describe the new developments, tools and online materials part of the UCLA SOCR resource. This includes: * Resource Organization * Features and Functionalities * Pedagogical utilization * SOCR Assessment * Future developments This is joint work with Annie Che and Jenny Cui, funded by NSF DUE 0442992 and NIH U54 RR021813. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T10:58:25-07:00 2006-04-06 Department of Statistics, Laboratory of Neuro Imaging false 4:00 PM 349 5127 Math Sciences Bldg. UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Ivo Dinov 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 This presentation consists of four parts: 1. In the first part the "generative model" proposed by Merlin Wittrock will be discussed as the theoretical foundation behind teaching for thinking and generation of knowledge by learners. 2. In the second part "blended instruction", implementation of "generative model" combined with technology and on-line quizzes, will be discussed as a mean of teaching for thinking in "Introductory Statistics". 3. In the third part, the concentration will be on: * Potential strategies the instructor can follow in designing multiple-choice and short-answer questions that make it possible to test for thinking in "introductory statistics", and * Examples of multiple-choice and short answer questions that help the instructor to test for thinking in "Introductory Statistics". In the fourth part the "challenge of teaching and testing for thinking" in large "Introductory Statistics" classes of 100-150 will be discussed. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T11:03:34-07:00 2005-06-03 Department of Statistics false 4:00 PM 350 9413 Boelter Hall UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Mahtash Esfandiari 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 "I always thought I was a great teacher until I asked what the students were learning." — Chris Gould, Professor of Physics, USC As part of the University of Southern California's 2004 strategic plan to create a more learner-centered university, USC's Center for Learning has developed and cultivated a program of ongoing assessment mediated through digital technologies. Ongoing assessment is centered around two ideas: 1) that students learn more when they are asked regularly to identify what they understand and where they are struggling, and 2) that understanding deepens when students are given regular feedback on assessments of their understanding. The practices and tools used in our ongoing assessment initiative include concept questions with "clicker" response (including Eric Mazur's Peer Instruction methodology), blogs and other student-centric digital tools for Just-in-Time Teaching (JiTT), and online journaling for metacognitive reflection. Future efforts will likely include personal or group knowledge bases using wikis and student-led informal learning using social networking software. This talk will be part theory, part case study, and part workshop. The goal will be to help faculty and practitioners to consider ways that some or all of the tools and practices that we have implemented might be used in their own courses to help students learn. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T11:05:26-07:00 2005-05-13 Center for Learning and Rossier School of Education false 4:00 PM 351 9413 Boelter Hall USC false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Jude Higdon 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 As the rate of enrollment in lower division classes continue to grow at UCLA, it has become more challenging to maintain the quality of instruction, student-teacher interaction, and constructive methods of student evaluation. The College of Letters and Science at UCLA is looking into blended instruction, combining technology and customary teaching methods, as a solution to this dilemma. To that end, in 2004 the College awarded three departments including Statistics grants to conduct case studies to examine the potential of blended instruction as a possible solution to the problem described above. In Winter 2005 blended instruction was implemented in Statistics 10, which has the highest enrollment rate (around 1700-1800 per year) in the department. The major objectives were to introduce statistics as a science of data, maximize the role of students as active learners, help the instructors and the TAs develop a better sense of the students progress through on-line quizzes, establish closer TA-student, instructor-student, and student-student contact, and use assessment to enhance upper level thinking and statistical thinking. The instructor and the two teaching assistants who conducted the blended instruction case study will share their experiences in this seminar. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-02T14:27:59-07:00 2005-05-10 Department of Statistics false 4:00 PM 124 9413 Boelter Hall UCLA false true UCLA Department of Statistics Seminar Mahtash Esfandiari 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 While many statistical consulting projects can be kept straightforward, drawing upon well polished skills of a good consultant, others projects are inherently more difficult. In some cases, the needs of the client can only be met with a push toward a "second solution" that avoids oversimplifications and untenable assumptions that plague the first solution approach. A good consultant recognizes these situations, and an ambitious consultant embraces them. As these opportunities develop, the relationship between the client and consultant evolves from a client-server model to a peer-to-peer model. When the client need matches the consultant's interest, the work can lead to some novel collaborative research. In this talk, we comment on some experience with this process, and offers suggestions as to how to nurture it. We also highlight how statistics graduate student training at UCR Has been enhanced by collaborative research in our consulting center. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T11:07:36-07:00 2005-05-06 Department of Statistics false 4:00 PM 352 9413 Boelter Hall UC Riverside false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Daniel R. Jeske 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 Students taking introductory statistics courses as a general education requirement typically do not list the course as a course they would choose to take. Many students feel resentment about "wasting their time and money" on a class that they couldn't care less about. These same students don't realize we have a tremendous product to offer them, one that will permeate their lives. Getting students involved and invested in their own learning when the course is a large lecture is particularly difficult. Students were invited to share ideas about why they did (or did not) attend lecture and how they could be more involved in the lecture. In this talk, I present some preliminary findings from the research. However, in the spirit of the study itself, I hope that this will be an interactive seminar. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T11:08:47-07:00 2005-04-29 Department of Statistics false 4:00 PM 353 9413 Boelter Hall Ohio State University false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Jackie Miller 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 Videos of classroom teaching collected as part of the Third International Mathematics and Science Study reveal that teaching is a cultural activity, varying more across cultures than within. It is learned implicitly; it is largely based on hidden cultural scripts; it is embedded in wider cultural beliefs and practices; and it is difficult to change. Given these facts, how can teaching be improved? In this presentation I will briefly describe most recent findings from the TIMSS Video Studies of mathematics teaching in seven countries, and discuss the implications of these findings for (a) current debates about mathematics teaching and learning in schools, and (b) teacher professional learning. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T11:09:51-07:00 2005-04-22 Department of Psychology false 4:00 PM 354 9413 Boelter Hall UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Jim Stigler 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 Every year the UCLA Office of Instructional Development (OID) accepts proposals from approximately 15 advanced graduate students to teach a seminar course of their own design. I was selected to teach “Making Sense of Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics” this Spring. The main objective of the course was not to teach students how to calculate statistics on their own or to run their own experiments, but to develop a critical statistical eye for evaluating statistical information found in mass media. This course also differs from standard introductory statistics courses in that OID required for both writing and discussion to be the main forms of student evaluation. This presentation will discuss the approach taken to achieve the course objective while meeting the requirements of the OID Collegium of University Teaching Fellows program, my assessment of how well the goals were met, and what some of the student feedback has been thus far. I will share what aspects have gone particularly well, and what I would improve upon if I were to teach a similar course in the future. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T11:14:47-07:00 2004-06-11 Department of Statistics false 4:00 PM 355 9413 Boelter Hall UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Katie Tranbarger 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 In this presentation I will discuss the potentials and limitations of GIS systems as an entry point for statistical reasoning in the context of highly-charged, meaningful social issues. First, I will make the general case for the use of GIS and social justice issues to teach statistics. Second, I will examine a pilot study of 28 high school students who engaged in a GIS project as part of a summer seminar in social research. Analyses of pre- and post-tests, and the students’ final PowerPoint presentations will be presented to document conceptual growth as well as the way in which mathematical reasoning was limited by the combination of the GIS tools and rhetorical structure of the projects. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T17:24:45-07:00 2004-06-04 Graduate School of Education and Information Sciences false 4:00 PM 356 9413 Boelter Hall UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Noel Enyedy 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 The objective of this presentation is to assess the extent to which Statistics 10, a lower division statistics course offered at the UCLA Department of Statistics, is in compliance with the new trends in statistics education. Given that evaluation of student learning is a good reflection of how a course is taught, the compliance of statistics 10 with new trends in statistics education was assessed through analyzing the midterm and final exams administered by statistics 10 instructors in 2002 2003. The questions analyzed fell into four major categories including multiple choice, true-false, word problems, and calculation problems. The content covered by these questions included design of experiments, exploratory data analysis, sampling, and hypothesis testing. The questions were analyzed according to the level of challenge and whether they were stated within a real world context. The levels of challenge included: 1) pure recall of information (level I), 2) comprehension of information (level II), and 3) upper level thinking skills including application, analysis, synthesis and evaluation of information (level III). The in-depth analysis of the exams indicated that overall Statistics 10 is in compliance with the new trends in statistics education including the importance of context and real data, emphasis on writing, and engaging students in upper level thinking skills. The detailed results will be presented in the seminar. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T17:26:52-07:00 2004-05-28 Department of Statistics false 4:00 PM 357 9413 Boelter Hall UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Mahtash Esfandiari 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 We will describe the philosophy, design, implementation and utilization of the Statistical Online Computational Resource (SOCR) for undergraduate and graduate education. Classical Probability and statistics instruction can be significantly enhanced by employing interactive, contemporary, computational, visualizational and graphical tools, in and out of class. We have developed one such suite of tools (SOCR) that consists of virtual experiments, distribution models, games, statistical analysis tools and other additional models (e.g., curve fittings, parameter estimates, probability tables, etc.) All of these tools are designed in a modern object oriented fashion and implemented as look-alike Java applets. The SOCR resources may be accessed by students from any Java-enabled computer. I will discuss how these tools have been used in my graduate and undergraduate classes to demonstrate statistical concepts, experimental properties, analytic methods and data manipulations (e.g., visualization). Over the past 3 years many statistics faculty and students have been involved in the development of the SOCR suite of tools (see online SOCR acknowledgments). Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T17:28:02-07:00 2004-05-18 Department of Statistics false 4:00 PM 358 9413 Boelter Hall UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Ivo Dinov 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 The presentation will describe a study on student learning as a result of completing a project sequence in introductory statistics. The projects required students to complete a written data analysis report for an investigation with real data while working within teams and using computer software. The presentation has four main foci. First I will describe the process that spawned this area of inquiry. Secondly, I will describe the impact of the term-long project sequence on student learning in introductory statistics. The third component describes the method of assessing that student learning using take-home examinations. The fourth component reports student feedback on completing both the projects and the take-home examinations. The major result is as a class, the students performed very well with approximately 85% of students earning a score of 80% or higher on the take-home exams. In addition, students reported generally positive aspects to working on the teams on the projects. Students also reported being adequately prepared for the first take-home examination. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T17:29:02-07:00 2004-05-14 Department of Mathematics false 4:00 PM 359 9413 Boelter Hall Cleveland State University false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar John Holcomb 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 The post-calculus Introductory Statistics course for Engineers and Computer Scientists is usually taught with textbooks that have very few examples for the computer science major, such as analysis of computer performance and algorithms, web browsing behavior of users, search engines, the Internet network, spam filtering, who uses the Internet, and other. In this talk, I will introduce some activities that I have prepared specifically to fill that gap. Most of these activities involve data analysis. I will also present an assessment of how some of the activities worked out in a class of 28 students where 80 percent of the students were either computer science majors alone or both computer science/engineering majors and the rest were math, applied math or econ/math students. I will describe which students chose which projects, and I will illustrate their work with a sample of their papers. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T17:30:58-07:00 2004-05-07 Department of Statistics false 4:00 PM 360 9413 Boelter Hall UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Juana Sanchez 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 I'll describe a new professional development program for secondary mathematics teachers who are preparing to teach statistics, and address what we have learned in our efforts to design a course that has a significant online component and that is relevant and useful from a teacher’s perspective. The ways in which our online environment incorporates group work, self-study, exploration of concepts, and assessments are described. The challenges associated with delivering the necessary content while at the same time recognizing the practical time constraints of adult students who are themselves teaching full-time are also discussed. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T17:32:05-07:00 2004-04-16 Department of Statistics false 4:00 PM 361 9413 Boelter Hall UCLA false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Robert Gould 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 Beginning in Kindergarten, students are now getting measured doses of statistics. After briefly reviewing recent efforts to take statistics into the schools, I summarize what we are learning from research about how younger students reason about data. I then describe how we are applying this research to the design of Tinkerplots. Tinkerplots is an educational data analysis software tool that we are developing with funding from the National Science Foundation and in collaboration with four middle school mathematics curricula. Tinkerplots, comes with no ready-made graphs. Students make plots by progressively organizing data using basic operators such as “separate,” “stack,” and “order.” By using these basic operators in different combination, students can make a large variety of plots and can smoothly transform one to another. In this way they can begin exploring data without knowing the difference between various data types (nominal, ordinal, ratio), without an explicit understanding of the difference between characteristics (tall) vs. variables (height), and without knowledge of the conventions of 2-D representations. The hope is that through using Tinkerplots in the spirit of Exploratory Data Analysis, they will systematically build up their understandings of various displays and the statistical ideas they embody. We’ll see. You can view a QuickTime demonstration of Tinkerplots posted at http://www.umass.edu/srri/serg/index.html Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T17:33:16-07:00 2003-05-15 Scientific Reasoning Research Institute false 4:00 PM 362 9413 Boelter Hall University of Massachusetts, Amherst false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Cliff Konold 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 In this talk, Dr. Brian Jersky, Chair of the Mathematics Deaprtment at Sonoma State University (SSU) and co-director of the SSU Statistical Consulting Center, will present an overview of how a new statistical consulting center, together with a new statistical consulting class at SSU, have resulted in increased opportunities for outreach into the surrounding community for both students and faculty, as well as increasing the number of majors in the Statistics track of SSU's Mathematics major. Examples of projects that have worked, and some that didn't, will be presented. There will be time for questions during and after the talk. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T17:35:51-07:00 2003-05-02 Department of Mathematics false 4:00 PM 363 9413 Boelter Hall Sonoma State University false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Brian Jersky 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 Most statistics courses integrate technology into the course. But often they just tack the technology onto the old syllabus. We propose a new alternative. We characterize what Statistics students need to know in three broad steps: Think, Show, and Tell. Think comprises identifying the variables, selecting methods, and checking conditions. The Show step is finding the numerical answers. Tell is the all-important (and often ignored) step of explaining the findings and drawing conclusions. Many traditional Statistics courses are, in this scheme, “just Show”. But the Show step is exactly what technology does well and what practicing Statisticians rely on technology to do. When students rely on their technology for the calculations, there is more time to concentrate on the Think and Tell steps. This approach swings the emphasis of the introductory statistics course toward statistical thinking and understanding and away from calculating statistics. We can also select formulas for the Show step that emphasize understanding, even if they would not have been the first choice for hand computing. We will report insights and practical solutions arising from our work on a new introductory textbook that follows this reasoning. Joint work with Richard D. DeVeaux, Williams College Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T17:38:16-07:00 2003-04-18 School of Industrial and Labor Relations false 4:00 PM 364 9413 Boelter Hall Cornell University false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Paul F. Velleman 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00 This presentation will describe the emergence of statistics education as a unique discipline over the past thirty years. The research literature supporting this discipline will be summarized and implications of this literature for teaching and assessing students will be suggested. New developments and important projects in statistics education will be shared. Center for the Teaching of Statistics 2009-06-14T17:39:38-07:00 2003-04-03 Department of Educational Pyschology false 4:00 PM 365 9413 Boelter Hall University of Minnesota false true Teaching of Statistics Seminar Joan Garfield 3:00 PM 2009-06-16T07:34:32-07:00