Resource Library

A song that may be used in discussing how to describe the distribution seen in a histogram by providing the shape and using statistical measures of location, variability, and deviations from the overall pattern (outliers). The lyrics were written by Mary McLellan from Aledo High School in Aledo, Texas as one of several dozen songs created for her AP statistics course. The song may be sung to the tune of the 2011 pop song We Are Young, by the band Fun. Also, an accompanying video may be found at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kkjlhdc5hlk

A cartoon to be used for discussing the value of data visualizations. The cartoon was used in the August 2016 CAUSE Cartoon Caption Contest. The winning caption was submitted by Barb Osyk from the University of Akron, while the drawing was created by John Landers using an idea from Dennis Pearl. Other honorable mentions that rose to the top of the judging included "I told you exploded pie charts are dangerous!" written by Aaron Profitt from God’s Bible School and College; "Liar liar, data on fire," written by Mickey Dunlap from University of Tennessee at Martin: and "I warned you about using hot deck imputation when you have so much missing data!" written by Elizabeth Stasny, from The Ohio State University. (to use this cartoon with an alternate caption simply download and replace the caption using a bolded comic sans font)

A cartoon to teach about the average and about positive versus negative skew. The cartoon was created by Diane L. Evans from Rose-Human Institute of Technology and won an honorable mention in the CAUSE 2013 A-Mu-sing contest.

I don't like the label big data", because that suggests the key measure is how many bits you have available to use. But who cares how much data you have? With too little data, you won't be able to make any conclusions that you trust. With loads of data you will find relationships that aren't real. ... Big data isn't about bits, it's about talent." This is a quote by ZestFinance.com CEO and former Google VP of Engineering Douglas Merrill (1970 -). The quote appeared in his May 1, 2012 blog at Forbes.com.

Lest men suspect your tale untrue, Keep probability in view. is a quote by English poet and playwright John Gay (1685 - 1732). The quote is the first two lines of the poem "The Painter who pleased Nobody and Everybody," which is fable number 18 from the from the 1727 collection "Fables" volume 1.

A cartoon to use in discussing the importance of indicating the variability associated with any prediction. The cartoon is the work of Theresa McCracken and appears as #5756 on McHumor.com (appearing here with a statistics-based caption change suggested by Dennis Pearl). Free for non-profit use in statistics course such as in lectures and course websites.

The two worksheets enable instructors to demonstrate how changes in the magnitude of the treatment effects and of the standard deviation of the error term will impact significance in a One-Way ANOVA model. The user specifies three input values that influence the simulation of random observations. ANOVA calculations are provided for the student, leaving the focus on the interpretation of the results. The mirror site (found at http://misnt.indstate.edu/cmclaren/ANOVA_Note.doc) contains an article that can serve as a teaching note to accompany the worksheets.

A song to aid in discussions about statistical models with non-normal errors. Sung by Canadian singer Gurdeep Stephens. Lyrics copyright and music performed by Michael Greenacre of Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona, Spain. May be sung to the tune of George and Ira Gershwin's 1935 standard "It Ain't Necessarily So"

A cartoon to teach about understanding large error bars (e.g. caused by the effect of outliers). The cartoon is #9 in the "Life in Research" series at www.vadio.com. Free to use with attribution in the classroom or on course websites.

A cartoon to teach the importance of including error bars to show the level of chance variation - as opposed to showing only the possibly strong trend that might be shown by averages. The cartoon is #22 in the "Life in Research" series at www.vadio.com. Free to use with attribution in the classroom or on course websites.