Proceedings

  • Many students find statistics difficult and unattractive. There is therefore an urgent need for teachers to consider new approaches and tools for teaching the subject. Many have advocated the use of microcomputers as teaching tool. When using microcomputers for teaching purposes, it is necessary to consider which software could be regarded as good teaching tools. A good teaching tool should, in my opinion, satisfy at least the following three criteria: (i) It should be reasonable priced, and readily available. (ii) It should be flexible thereby allowing teachers to introduce modifications in response to the special needs of their students. (iii) It should be able to demonstrate the basic concepts of the subject. The ease in which spreadsheets can be used to convey basic statistical concept is demonstrated in what follows.

  • After describing deficiencies in statistical packages, Peter Schwanenberg lists seven important points for producing and judging of statistical software for teaching. The more points satisfied, the better. No existing software satisfies all of the requirements, although some are coming close.

  • First of all we want to review the present state and analyse some current problems of mathematics education, particularly probability and statistics education, in Japanese senior high schools.

  • For over twenty years statistical software has been employed in introductory applied statistics courses. It has been used to calculate descriptive statistics, probabilities, confidence intervals, hypothesis test statistics, and linear regressions. Recently, statistical calculators with many of the capabilities of existing software have appeared. In this paper the authors explained the pedagogical advantages and disadvantages of each tool. They compared the capabilities of MINITAB, a widely-used general-purpose data analysis system, with the HP-21S, a relatively inexpensive Hewlett-Packard stat/math calculator. They also presented the preliminary results of an experiment comparing the use of these two computing tools in the classroom.

  • Our program package for computers has been constructed mainly to assist in teaching. Its characteristic features are as follows: 1) It is constructed for easy handling. 2) Its function carefully follows the content of standard textbooks of high school mathematics. 3) It is aimed at learners who are not so good at mathematics. 4) The package is, at present, restricted to assist studying of only the most fundamental concepts included in the standard textbooks. 5) The introductory parts explaining new concepts are programmed for the screen to change slowly enough. 6) Almost all of the computer screens are programmed with many colours and some with movements. 7) User-friendly manuals to operate the package are being prepared. For further details, please contact the author at the address listed in the index.

  • From the statistical education point of view, each discipline teacher needs to fond that discipline's relationship to statistics before statistics can provide a meeting ground, a common "language", with other disciplines. A basic idea of its principles and a certain baseline awareness and appreciation of its possibilities (with respect to "my" discipline) are needed fist of all. Statistics Prize entries show that this kind of cross-curriculum project is usually better handled in primary schools. There, the teachers are general in their orientation, so they already have an elective view of research activities. At secondary level, however, this perspective has often disappeared and has to be encouraged in the teachers first before their students will get a taste of real cross-curricular work.

  • Describes work submitted to statistical competitions in Hong Kong.

  • To overcome of the difficulties that external examinations present for the teaching of statistics, a number of countries have introduced course work into their assessment. This paper looks at how this is done in New Zealand.

  • In 1988 the GCSE examination was introduced in England and Wales to replace the dual system of examinations taken at age 16 years. GCE (for the most able) and CSE (for the majority). Certificates are awarded in individual subjects. Most school pupils take from six to ten subjects, nearly always including Mathematics and English. One of the many subjects on offer is Statistics which entails both written examination and course work. GCSE Statistics is normally taken as a two-year course (age 14-16) although some candidates take it the year after sitting their main GCSE examinations, as a one-year course (age 16-17). It is very much a minority subject (perhaps taken by 1% of all school candidates). Currently there are five separate examination boards for England and Wales providing five different syllabuses. However, in 1992 all five will combine to provide a single syllabus, to be first examined in 1994. A working party of the Joint Rationalisation Group for the GCSE Boards is currently devising the new syllabus. Final agreement had not yet been reached although much progress has been made.

  • In this paper, practical experiments are used not only to illustrate the binomial distribution, but to make it relevant and important to the pupils. The aim is to take statistics and probability out of the textbook and into the pupils' direct experience.

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