Statistics is viewed as having no true connection with real-life activities. Even the typical components of an introductory statistics course (descriptive statistics, probability, and inferenctial statisticsP are seen as being unrelated to each other. Often descriptive statistics, being less mathematically sophisticated, is rushed through, then lase of probability and combinatorics are inroduced via formulas, and finally inferential statistics is presented. The link between inferential statistics and probability is often completely lost upon the student (Hawkins, Jolliffe, & Glickman, 1992). Most research in statisitcs education has been focused upon what the instructor can do to imrpove the cognitive side of instruction (Gal & Ginsberg, 1992); Fordon, 1999). RElatively less research has focused upon the statistics student (some examples are Gal & Ginsberg, 1994; Garfield, 1995; Gordon, 1995a, 1995b, 1999). In particular, little work has been done in exploring the approach to learning used by statistics students; one such work, that classified students as using either a deep or surface approach to learning, is by Gordon (1999).
The CAUSE Research Group is supported in part by a member initiative grant from the American Statistical Association’s Section on Statistics and Data Science Education