Writing Assignments in an
Introductory Statistics Course
Joy Jordan, Lawrence University
joy.jordan@lawrence.edu
May 13, 2008 (CAUSE webinar)
Important Points from the Writing
Literature
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Use of writing as a learning tool (I think we are
already sold on this idea)
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Suggestions about assignment creation
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Research about revision and feedback
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Descriptions of different types of writing
Assignment Creation
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Clear definition and articulation of assignments
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Specify RAFT criteria: Role, Audience, Format, and
Theme/Task/Topic (adapted from Bean, 2001)
Include a grading rubric (make expectations clear to
students)
“When planning assignments, teachers need to
consider not only the learning goals they have set
for their courses but also the thinking and writing
processes that they want to invoke in their students
as learners.” (Bean, p. 77)
Revision and Feedback
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Importance of revision
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“Research indicates that when teachers make remarks on
papers and return those papers to students while offering
them no opportunity to revise, the remarks have little
effect on subsequent papers.” (Dohrer, 1991)
Student misunderstanding of the revision process
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Students typically think of revision at the micro- or
editing-level (e.g., finding the right word, correcting
grammar), whereas experienced writers believe revision
involves macro-level changes (e.g., restructuring,
additions, deletions) (Sommers, 1980)
Revision and Feedback
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The message your feedback sends to your students
Feedback mistakes (see e.g., Sommers 1982, Bean 2001)
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Too vague (comments that are not specific to the student
text and give no guidance for change)
Too many (give no sense of priorities for revision)
Too micro-level (give the impression that revision really
is simply an editing process)
Too negative (important to additionally point out what a
student has done well)
Revision and Feedback
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Potential time savers
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Thoughtful assignment creation (well-planned
assignments are easier and more enjoyable to grade)
Smaller microthemes (Bean, 2001)
Ways of marking (put simple check marks next to lines
that contain grammatical errors—Haswell, 1983; put a
straight line under sentences that are especially well
written and a wavy line under passages that are
problematic—Elbow, 1997)
Peer review of writing (see e.g., Holt 1992, Bean 2001)
Types of Writing
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Informal versus formal writing (see e.g., Britton
1975, Elbow 1997)
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“If we are not so much teaching writing as using
writing to teach something else, it makes
particularly good sense to use lots of minimal and
low stakes response.” (Elbow, 1997)
Examples for the Statistics Classroom
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Informal/low-stakes writing assignments
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In-class, free-response writing in answer to a question
(e.g., “Why is the variability of the sample mean smaller
than the variability of individual observations?”)
Journal writing (e.g., responses to class reading, activities,
homework problems, or experiences with statistics
outside of class)
Minute papers at the end of class
Examples for the Statistics Classroom
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Formal/high-stakes writing assignments
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Press release summarizing, in layperson terms, the results
of a complicated experimental study
Letter home in response to a statistics question from a
parent
Letter to the editor in response to a newspaper article
that makes use of statistics
Statistics project report (intro, methods, results,
discussion) or just one focused part of the report
Mathematics or statistics autobiography
Meaningful paragraph (write about statistics terms
appropriately in context)
Examples from my Classroom
Assignment #1
Suppose you receive the following letter from your dad:
Hey Kiddo,
I am worried about Grandma. Remember that she was diagnosed with high blood pressure?
Well, she’s currently taking the medication Makemewell to lower her blood pressure. At the
time of Grandma’s diagnosis, her doctor said that a randomized, double-blind experiment
had been conducted and that Makemewell was shown more effective in lowering blood
pressure than a placebo. To be honest, I have no idea what any of that means, but I believed
and trusted the doctor. Now I’ve heard two stories that make me think differently. Larry,
our next-door-neighbor, was taking Makemewell and he got a terrible fever that put him in
the hospital. Also, my co-worker, Sally, actually had her blood pressure go up while she was
taking Makemewell! I’m now very suspicious of this medication.
I know that you’re taking a statistics course at college. Based on the information I’ve given
you, do you think Grandma should stop taking her medication? Whatever your opinion, will
you please explain yourself thoroughly and clearly? (I will draw on your responses when I
talk with the doctor.) And please don’t use any statistics mumbo-jumbo that I won’t
understand. I really appreciate your help with this.
Love, Dad
Your assignment is to type a 1-2 page letter (single-spaced, 12-pt. font) responding to
your dad.
Examples from my Classroom
Assignment #1 Grading Criteria (25 points possible)
____ The explanation to your dad convinces me (your teacher) that you
understand the following: what a randomized, double-blind experiment is;
what anecdotal evidence is; and which of these data collection methods is
appropriate for decision making. (10 points)
____ The explanation to your dad is thorough, well organized, and clear.
(5 points)
____ The explanation to your dad is presented in non-technical terms that
he will understand. (5 points)
____ You successfully paid attention to accepted conventions of language
use (syntax, spelling, grammar, readability, etc.) (5 points)
Examples from my Classroom
Assignment #2
Suppose you receive another letter from your dad:
Hey Kiddo,
Thanks so much for your response to my last letter. I now understand what a randomized, double-blind
experiment is, and I feel better about the money I’m spending on your college education. Grandma is
still taking Makemewell, and we’re monitoring her progress.
I got more information from the doctor about the Makemewell experiment. The doctor said that 40
high-blood-pressure patients took Makemewell and 40 patients took a placebo (and the patients were all
around Grandma’s age). The average reduction in systolic blood pressure was 19.5 millimeters of
mercury (mm Hg) for the Makemewell group and 9.1 mm Hg for the placebo group. This much I can
understand. Then the doctor mentioned significance testing (and hypotheses), and she said the
difference in average blood pressures was statistically significant based on a p-value that was less than
0.001. Do you know what the doctor is talking about? What are all these terms, and how can they help
me understand the effect of Makemewell? As before, please explain yourself thoroughly and clearly, and
don’t use any technical language.
I’m really glad you’re taking a statistics class this term. Your knowledge has been very helpful.
Love, Dad
PS I’m enclosing a check to get you through the rest of the term.
Your assignment is to type a 1-page letter (single-spaced, 12-pt. font) responding to your
dad.
Examples from my Classroom
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Lessons learned from letter-to-dad assignments
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Modification of the rubric for assignment #1 (from “you
understand the statistical concepts involved in the
assignment” to something more specific)
Assignment #2 illuminated more student misperceptions
than did assignment #1
Even though the assignments were focused microthemes,
the grading load was still too large for me (true
confession: I haven’t yet truly learned the time-saving
methods I previously mentioned)
Examples from my Classroom
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Elaine Backus, an entomology professor at the
University of Missouri, created a writing assignment
called a “meaningful paragraph”
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She defines a “meaningful paragraph” as one
continuous piece of writing that uses all of the
words from a given subset and in which the
sentences make sense and hang together
Examples from my Classroom
Meaningful Paragraph Assignment #1
Write a meaningful paragraph that includes the following terms: correlation, causation,
regression line, predicted value(s), scatterplot, residual(s), and outlier(s). (The paragraph you turn
in should be typed, not hand written. Furthermore, please proofread your paragraph
before turning it in.)
A “meaningful paragraph” is one continuous piece of writing, which uses all of the
listed words and in which the sentences make sense and hang together. That is, the ideas
in the paragraph must illustrate you understand the new terms in a way that allows you to write
meaningfully about them in context. You may not simply write seven sequential sentences,
for example, that merely define the terms; sentences must demonstrate appropriate
relationships between the terms.
Example Meaningful Paragraph
(For the terms mean, median, distribution, standard deviation, outlier, and skewed)
The CEO of a local company said the mean annual salary for the company’s employees is $57,000. Upon
further investigation of the data, though, the distribution of annual salaries appears severely right skewed.
Hence, the median (rather than the mean) is really a better measure of typical annual salary, since the
mean is pulled up by the high salaries in the long tail of the distribution. Because the mean is not the
best measure of typical salary, the standard deviation should not be used as a measure of the variation in
the salaries (since it measures the spread from the mean). The CEO thought the high average value
might entice workers to apply for jobs at the company. In fact, the CEO’s salary ($840,000) is an
extreme outlier in the distribution (it’s well outside even the long right tail), and her income value inflates
the average company salary in a misleading way.
Examples from my Classroom
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Meaningful-paragraph terms used in next three
assignments:
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bias, nonresponse, parameter, population, random sample, statistic, and
undercoverage
sampling distribution, population mean, sample mean, normal distribution,
sample size, and probability
statistical significance (or statistically significant), probability, population
mean, sample mean, P-value, and practical significance (or practically
significant).
Positives about the meaningful paragraphs
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Much less time grading
Gives students the opportunity to be creative, yet also
clearly shows students’ misperceptions
General Suggestions
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Heed the advice of the writing-to-learn literature
(yet adjust to your course goals and teaching style)
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Purposefully design writing tasks to meet learning
goals (and consider the thinking process associated
with the writing exercise)
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Start small (always good advice) and make
appropriate adjustments along the way
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Find colleagues to join you on your journey (e.g.,
teaching circle)
A Few Resources
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Bean, J. (2001), Engaging Ideas: The Professor’s Guide to Integrating Writing, Critical Thinking,
and Active Learning in the Classroom, San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Britton, J., Burgess, T., Martin, N., McLeod, A., Rosen, H. (1975), The Development of
Writing Abilities (11-18), London: MacMillan.
Dohrer, G. (1991), “Do Teachers’ Comments on Students’ Papers Help?” College
Teaching, 39(2), 48-58.
Elbow, P. (1997), “High Stakes and Low Stakes in Assigning and Responding to
Writing,” in Sorcinelli & Elbow (eds.), Writing to Learn: Strategies for Assigning and
Responding to Writing Across the Disciplines (pp. 5-13), San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Emig, J. (1977), “Writing as a Mode of Learning,” College Composition and Communication,
28(2), 122-128.
Fulwiler, T. (1982), “Writing: An Act of Cognition,” in Griffin, C.W. (ed.), New
Directions for Teaching and Learning: Teaching Writing in All Disciplines (pp. 15-26), San
Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Haswell, R. (1983), “Minimal Marking,” College English, 45(6), 600-604.
Herrington, A. (1981), “Writing to Learn: Writing Across the Disciplines,” College
English, 43(4), 379-387.
Holt, M. (1992), “The Value of Written Peer Criticism,” College Composition and
Communication, 43(3), 384-392.
A Few Resources
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Langer, J.A. and Applebee, A.N. (1987), How Writing Shapes Thinking: A Study of
Teaching and Learning, National Council of Teachers of English.
MacAllistar, J. (1982), “Responding to Student Writing,” in Griffin, C.W. (ed.), New
Directions for Teaching and Learning: Teaching Writing in All Disciplines (pp. 59-65), San
Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Radke-Sharpe, N. (1991), “Writing as a Component of Statistics Education,” The
American Statistician, 45(4), 292-293.
Rose, B. (1989), “Writing and Mathematics: Theory and Practice,” in Connolly
& Vilardi (eds.), Writing to Learn in Mathematics and Science (pp. 15-30), New
York: Teachers College Press.
Samsa, G. and Oddone, E. (1994), “Integrating Scientific Writing into a
Statistics Curriculum: A Course in Statistically Based Scientific Writing,” The
American Statistician, 48(2), 117-119.
Sommers, N. (1980), “Revision Strategies of Student Writers and Experienced
Adult Writers,” College Composition and Communication, 31(4), 378-388.
Sommers, N. (1982), “Responding to Student Writing,” College Composition and
Communication, 33(2), 148-156.
Stromberg, A. And Ramanathan, S. (1996), “Easy Implementation of Writing in
Introductory Statistics Courses,” The American Statistician, 50(2), 159-163.