Approximating a normal distribution with a binomial distribution
Approximating a normal distribution with a binomial distribution
This page supports an in-class exercise that highlights several key Bayesian concepts. The scenario is as follows: a large paper bag contains pieces of candy with wrappings of different color, and we are interested in learning about the unknown proportion of yellow-wrapped pieces of candy. After completing the exercises, we will be familiar with the following concepts and ideas: probability distributions can quantify degree of belief, prior distribution, posterior distribution, sequential updating, conjugacy, Cromwell’s Rule (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cromwell's_rule), the data overwhelm the prior, Bayes factors, Savage-Dickey density ratio, sensitivity analysis, coherence.
The goal of this text is to provide a broad set of topics and methods that will give students a solid foundation in understanding how to make decisions with data. This text presents workbook-style, project-based material that emphasizes real world applications and conceptual understanding. Each chapter contains:
The text is highly adaptable in that the various chapters/parts can be taken out of order or even skipped to customize the course to your audience. Depending on the level of in-class active learning, group work, and discussion that you prefer in your course, some of this work might occur during class time and some outside of class.
Statistics forum for questions/conversations ranging from homework problems in statistics and probability and help using statistical software to statistical research inquiries and career advising.
This is a site that contains a number of types of material that can be used in teaching about chance and probability. Lesson plans, syllabi, suggested activities, and data sets are available. The data sets contain interesting information for students such as: quarterback passing rating data, baseball streaks, and baseball salaries that can be used to illustrate means, medians, etc.. The site also contains a link to the Chance News (which is now a wiki on CAUSEweb).
Share with your students why the presence of an outlier affects which measure of central tendency to report. Feel free to modify this Powerpoint presentation to fit the needs of your students. Included at the end are additional online resources to further engage your students in their learning about the mean, median, and mode. The presentation is covered by a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License.
This applet builds confidence intervals for the percentage of orange candies in box with two colors of candies. A smaller box visualizes the sample, and a graph keeps track of the location of the confidence interval. Students can take one sample (producing one CI) repeatedly, or take 100 random samples at once. The population percentage is hidden from view unless the student asks to see it, in which case it is displayed on the graph of confidence intervals. This allows the students to see whether each interval "hits" or "misses". Several parameters can be varied: sample size, confidence level and number of samples. A set of questions alongside the applet guides students.
This issue contains articles about Karl Pearson (150 years after his birth); finding more ways to make learning statistics fun; simulating capture-recapture sampling in Excel and by hand; common misconceptions in statistics; a correlation-based puzzler and a STAT.DOKU puzzle.
OStats is a simple tool for data visualisation and statistical analysis, particularly aimed at helping students learn statistics.
A song for use in helping students to recognize when the Central Limit Theorem applies. Music & Lyrics ©2016 by Greg Crowther from Everett Community College. This song is part of an NSF-funded library of interactive songs that involved students creating responses to prompts that are then included in the lyrics (see www.causeweb.org/smilesfor the interactive version of the song, a short reading covering the topic, and an assessment item).