The necessity for stimulating the interest of pupils in mathematics in general and statistics in particular is made clear by the results of surveys. The studies showed, that pupils are tired of mathematics. Mathematics is generally regarded as one of the most unpopular subjects at school. The pupils don't achieve so well in this subject . The causes might originate in several variables. The spectrum of possible causes for these bad results stretches from genetic disposition to deficits in learning behaviour. One of the aspect is that mathematics/statistics use the symbol language. And just exactly this language is what we want to look at more closely. As an essential feature of symbols the fact must be emphasized that they "all mean something other than themselves, that they all point to something besides themselves".
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