Using a Faculty Learning Community to Develop High-Impact, Little-Time Activities to Help Students Better Understand the Meaning of Parameter

Abstract

Research on faculty professional development suggests that in order for faculty to change their teaching, they must perceive a problem, be presented with changes they can adapt to their own teaching style, and see evidence of change in student learning based on the changes. Many words in statistics pose a barrier for entry level students because they everyday meanings which differ from their discipline usage within statistics; this can lead to lexical ambiguity for students. The webinar will focus on two High-Impact, Little-Time (HILT) activities developed by faculty involved in a faculty learning community to help exploit lexical ambiguities associated with parameter. We will present the activities, along with the data that show the effectiveness of the activities with respect to student learning.