Literature Index

The focus of the reflections presented here is the teacher's point of view on the teaching and learning of statistical concepts. This paper reports the research efforts carried out recently by our group with converging results. We identified that teachers have difficulty in teaching topics related to statistics, particularly when some analysis of the data is required. Teacher discourse shows they favor the philosophy of Exploratory Data Analysis (EDA), but in practice, they restrict their work, according to the results of our study, to a more technical approach that emphasizes the use of algorithms. This research suggests the need for initial and continued training in statistics for mathematics teachers.

The aim was to revise a statistics course in order to get the students motivated to learn statistics and to integrate statistics more throughout a psychology course. Further, we wish to make students become more interested in statistics and to help them see the importance of using statistics in psychology research. To achieve this goal, several changes were made in the course. The theoretical framework to motivate teaching method changes was taken from the statistics education literature together with the ideas of student-centered learning and Kolb's learning circle. One of the changes was to give the students research problems in the beginning of the course that were used throughout the course and which they should be able to solve at the end of the course. Other changes were to create a course webpage and to use more computer-based assignments instead of assignments with calculators. The students' test results and their answers on the Survey of Attitudes Toward Statistics, SATS, (Schau, Stevens, Dauphinee, & Del Vecchio, 1995) together with course evaluations showed that by changing the course structure and the teaching, students performed better, and were more positive towards statistics even though statistics was not their major.

Filipinos are natural gamblers; we bet on anything and everything besides horses. Our perception of risk is often irrational. We are subjected to opinion polls provided by the media, without being able to question the accuracy of their reports. As such, we need to understand some of the ideas of probability and frequencies. Understanding statistics is important for individuals in their daily lives and, as citizens in a democratic society, statistics must be taught directly or integrated in the teaching of science or other courses, especially at the lower levels of education where only a minority ever reach college. The question asked: How effective is the teaching of statistics in the Philippines?

This report discusses teaching statistics to children of all grades in schools in Australia.