You are here

Home › TLRI research › Research completed › School sector › Building students' inferential reasoning: Statistics curriculum Levels 5 and 6

Building students' inferential reasoning: Statistics curriculum Levels 5 and 6

Funding year: 
2009
Duration:
2 years
Organisation: 
Auckland UniServices
Sector: 
School sector
Project start date: 
January 2009
Project end date: 
January 2011
Principal investigator(s): 
Dr. Maxine Pfannkuch, Dr. Pip Arnold
Research team members: 
Chris Wild and Matt Regan, University of Auckland
Research partners: 
Anna Martin, Avondale College; Jason Ellwood, Otumoetai College; Jason Florence, Otahuhu College; Jeanette Saunders, St Cuthbert’s College; Lindsay Smith, Epsom Girls’ Grammar School; Marina McFarland, Auckland

Project Description

The project was a two-year collaboration among two statisticians, two researchers, and nine teachers. There was an urgent need to understand how students can progressively develop informal statistical inferential reasoning from Levels 5 to 8 of the new curriculum. The project team designed innovative approaches to develop students’ informal inferential reasoning and sought evidence that these innovations had a significant effect on improving students’ statistical reasoning in this domain.

The major implications of the key findings outlined in our summary report are:

  • Building students’ statistical concepts means the focus of learning shifts from how to construct plots and calculate “mean-median-mode” to how to reason from plots.
  •  Hands-on activities, using gestures, and dynamic visual imagery, which strongly connect sampling variability, plots, and inference, make concepts accessible for learning about decision-making under uncertainty.
  •  Engaging students’ imagination and contextual knowledge, and developing their language to describe shape are central to improving their statistical reasoning and thinking.

Dynamic Visual Imagery

                           Dynamic Visual Imagery

 

Project Outputs

​2010

Presentations, conferences and workshops

​Ellwood, J. (2010). Developing Informal Inference at Level 6. Workshop at the Bay of Plenty Mathematics Association Teachers Day, 22 November 2010.

Pfannkuch, M., Regan, M., & Wild, C. (2010). Generalising from data. Presentation at Getstats Week, Plymouth University, Plymouth, 22-27 October 2010.

Wild, C. (2010). Early statistical inferences: “the eyes have it.” Presentation at Getstats Week, Plymouth University, Plymouth, 22-27 October 2010.

Pfannkuch, M., & Regan, M. (2010). Engaging with Shape. Workshop at Getstats Week, Plymouth University, Plymouth, 22-27 October 2010.

Pfannkuch, M., & Regan, M. (2010). Making a claim. Workshop at Getstats Week, Plymouth University, Plymouth, 22-27 October 2010.

Pfannkuch, M., Regan, M., & Wild, C. (2010). Generalising from data. Presentation at the Fourth International CensusAtSchool Workshop, Royal Statistical Society, London, 21 October 2010.

Wild, C. (2010). Early statistical inferences: “the eyes have it." Presentation at the Fourth International CensusAtSchool Workshop, Royal Statistical Society, London, 21 October 2010.

Pfannkuch, M., & Regan, M. (2010). Engaging with Shape. Workshop at the Fourth International CensusAtSchool Workshop, Royal Statistical Society, London, 21 October 2010.

Pfannkuch, M., & Regan, M. (2010). Making a claim. Workshop at the Fourth International CensusAtSchool Workshop, Royal Statistical Society, London, 21 October 2010.

Wild, C., Pfannkuch, M., Regan, M., & Horton, N. (2010). Towards more accessible conceptions of statistical inference. Paper presented by Chris Wild at the launch of the UK 10-year statistical literacy campaign, World Statistics Day, Royal Statistical Society, London, 20 October 2010.

Pfannkuch, M., Arnold, P., Wright, S., Florence, J., Ellwood, J., Smith, L. & McFarland, M. (2010). Developing inferential reasoning: Stories from Statistics classes. Presentation followed by Workshops at the Auckland Mathematical Association Statistics Teachers Day, 2 December 2010.
www.censusatschool.org.nz/2009/informal-inference/

Wild, C., Pfannkuch, M., Regan, M., & Horton, N. (2010). Towards more accessible conceptions of statistical inference. Paper presented by Chris Wild at the launch of the UK 10-year statistical literacy campaign, World Statistics Day, Royal Statistical Society, London, 20 October 2010.
www.rss.org.uk/main.asp?page=1321&event=1175 

Pfannkuch, M. (2010). Laying foundations for inference. Mathematics Education Unit Seminar, University of Auckland, 1 October 2010

2009

Presentations, conferences and workshops

Pfannkuch, M. (2009). Building students’ inferential reasoning in statistics: Research in progress. Mathematics Education Unit Seminar at The University of Auckland, 28 August 2009.

Pfannkuch, M., & Wild, C. (2009). Building inferential reasoning in statistics. Keynote presentation at the National Numeracy Conference, Auckland, 16-19 February 2009.
http://www.censusatschool.org.nz/2009/informal-inference/