SBI members,
I'm teaching an 8-week 'accelerated' intro stat course this semester for
students who've had calculus or AP statistics and am in week 4, which means
I'm about halfway. The course is entirely online this semester so we don't
have class 'today' per se, but are working this week on comparing two group
proportions---seeing, for the first time, a permutation test as a way to
simulate the null hypothesis (we've done one-sample inference since week
one). Like Allan, I'll be doing the swimming with dolphins activity among
others. Other highlights this week include (1) A two-proportion Z test (as
a convenient mathematical approximation to the permutation test---with some
extra data conditions needed), (2) Introducing R (we've been using web
applets all semester so far but students will be introduced to R use on
their projects if they wish) and (3) Reading and writing on the difference
between mathematics (primarily deductive reasoning) and statistics
(primarily inductive reasoning), and how this relates to what we can and
can't learn from statistics, etc. etc (we can do this already because we've
been doing statistical inference for 4 weeks already!)
Great to hear from others of you about the innovative/interesting things
you're doing in the class!
On Sun, Feb 1, 2015 at 11:34 PM, Allan Rossman <arossman(a)calpoly.edu> wrote:
Happy Groundhog Day!
I continue to find it inexplicable that neither private colleges nor
public universities see fit to cancel classes out of respect for this
august occasion. But this year I've decided to try to make the best of
this lamentable oversight, and I need your help!
I think it might be fun to ask introductory statistics teachers to compare
notes on what's happening in their classes on one particular day. What
better day than Groundhog Day for revisiting the same question over and
over, and over and over, and over and over, from multiple perspectives?
I'm writing this after Groundhog Day has officially begun in Punxsutawney,
Pennsylvania, but it's shortly after 9pm on Super Bowl Sunday here in
California. So, to get the ball rolling on this whimsical idea (I strongly
prefer the word "whimsical" to "silly" in this context), I'll use
future
tense to anticipate what will happen in my class on Monday. I plan to be
sound asleep when Punxsutawney Phil makes his celebrated prognostication.
(Too much information: Thirty years ago I did indeed make the trek to
Gobbler's Knob with my future bride before sunrise on February 2, but I
won't be up so early or anywhere near Punxsutawney this year!)
My introductory students and I in STAT 217-09 at Cal Poly will begin the
fifth week of our ten week term on February 2 by finishing up a discussion
of principles of well-designed experiments. We’ll discuss a study
conducted at Harvard about whether students spend $50 differently depending
on whether they’re told that it’s a “tuition rebate” or “bonus income.” Then
we’ll consider one of the first studies of the drug AZT for reducing
mother-to-child transmission of HIV. We’ll culminate this discussion by
collecting some in-class data on a very simple randomized experiment
investigating whether grouping of letters can affect memory. All students
will receive the same 30 letters in the same order, but some will find
convenient, recognizable three-letter groupings and others will see more
irregular groupings of letters.
Then I expect to have time to introduce a study about whether swimming
with dolphins is beneficial to patients who suffer from clinical
depression. We'll discuss the design of the study and do a quick
exploration of the 2x2 table of results, setting the stage for simulating a
randomization test to assess whether the difference between success
proportions in two treatment groups is statistically significant. Carrying
out this simulation in class, using cards and then an applet, will have to
wait until February 3 when the excitement of the momentous day has passed.
(Or who knows, perhaps my students and I will find when we awake on Tuesday
that we are destined to magically relive Monday again and again...)
Please indulge me in this fanciful exercise by replying to this
Simulation-Based Inference listserv with a description of what happened, or
will happen, in your introductory statistics class on Groundhog Day 2015.
Maybe we statistics teachers will learn something interesting by exchanging
this information and reflecting on the variety of responses. Even if
not, we can honor the grand tradition of Groundhog Day by engaging in a
substantially less grand but only marginally more silly (oops, I mean
whimsical) one.
With best wishes for the special day and for an early spring (to those of
you who must endure winter),
Allan Rossman
--
Allan J. Rossman
Professor and Chair
Statistics Department
Cal Poly
San Luis Obispo, CA 93407arossman@calpoly.eduhttp://statweb.calpoly.edu/arossman/
--
Nathan Tintle, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Statistics and Dept. Chair
Director for Research and Scholarship
Dordt College
Sioux Center, IA 51250
nathan.tintle(a)dordt.edu
Phone: (712) 722-6264
Office: SB1612