Some initial thoughts on my “radical” redesign of intro stats
- I need a new example of Simpson’s Paradox. Anyone got any ideas?
- I think we need to talk much more about sampling methods in intro stats courses. I don’t know how much other people talk about this, but I usually mention it in like 15 minutes in one class and then we never talk about it again.
- I want to employ the “theory, simulation, example” for all the topics that I am going to cover. So for instance, for a one sample t-test we would talk about what the form of the t-test is (in more advanced classes we could derive it using the idea of ancillary statistics), then using R simulate the test statistic over and over again to see the actual distribution of the test statistic, then get an actual set of data and do an example. Theory. Simulation. Example.
- I think ethics should be included in every intro stats course. I’ve never formally done it before, I want to include it in this, and I have no actual idea how to include it. Anyone have any thoughts?
- I’m heavily relying on the GAISE report for ideas about what to include in my course. Instead of traditional chapters from a book, I think I’m going to use their nine goals as 9 modules in my course. And then I’ll put the appropriate techniques into each of those modules. Only issue is that I want software to appear in all of the modules so I’ll need to re-order that goal from 8 to like 2.
- I really like the distinction that the GAISE report makes between CONSUMERS and PRODUCERS of statistics. I’m teaching STAT335, which is Introduction to Biostatistics. These students will be about 50% consumer and 50% producers. The course should be tailored to that. In our STAT 103 course, the students are going to be 95% consumers of statistics. We need to revamp that course to account for that. I’ve never really thought about that distinction before in terms of developing course material for an intro stat course.
- At Loyola we have essentially 3 intro stats courses: 103, 203, and 335. Right now that are largely the same intro stats course with different students and slightly difference math requirements. My goal long term is to totally re-design these so that 103 is geared towards consumers, 203 is geared towards producers, and 335 is right in the middle for consumers and producers.
- The GAISE report in incredible.
Posted on January 3, 2020, in Uncategorized. Bookmark the permalink. Leave a comment.
Stats in the Wild 
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