GAISE in the Online Course
Michelle Everson, University of Minnesota
Sue B. Schou, Idaho State University
Patti B. Collings, Brigham Young University
Jamis Perrett, Texas A & M University
Six GAISE Recommendations
1) Emphasize statistical literacy and develop statistical
thinking
2) Use real data
3) Stress conceptual understanding rather than mere
knowledge of procedures
4) Foster active learning in the classroom
5) Use technology for developing conceptual
understanding and analyzing data
6) Use assessments to improve and evaluate student
learning
Using Technology to Emphasize Statistical
Literacy and Enhance Software Instruction
Michelle Everson
Department of Educational Psychology
University of Minnesota
Email: gaddy001@umn.edu
Who I am and what I do
• I’ve been teaching online for 5 years and I helped
develop several online courses in my department
• Currently, I teach the following online courses:
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EPSY 3264:
EPSY 5261:
EPSY 5262:
EPSY 5271:
Basic and Applied Statistics
Introductory Statistical Methods
Intermediate Statistical Methods
Becoming a Teacher of Statistics
• Class sizes are typically around 30 students
– Students come from a variety of disciplines (Education,
Nursing, Social Sciences)
• WebVista is the classroom management system used
• Collaboration, group discussion, and activity are big
parts of all courses
Example Course Site
Example Weekly Module
Snapshot of Discussion Rooms
Using Technology in the Online Course
• Are there ways we might use technology to emphasize
statistical literacy?
• If we want students to become savvy and critical consumers of
statistics used in the media and in published research studies, what
types of assignments and activities might we want to use in our
courses?
• What are some things that might really motivate and engage
students, or entice them to be on the lookout for uses and misuses
of statistics in the real world?
• How can technology be used to enhance software
instruction?
• Students who must learn to use statistical software in an online
course may need extra support
– Detailed handouts do not always work
– Available software tutorials sometimes fall short
– Students may benefit from opportunities to witness their own instructor model the thinking
and reasoning process involved in exploring and analyzing data
Project #1: The Great Statistics Twitter
Experiment
• Students are asked to set up a Twitter account and to
follow the instructor (www.twitter.com/MGEverson)
• Students (and the instructor) “tweet” about a variety of
things
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News articles that include statistical information
Cartoons related to statistics
Poll results
Misleading graphs or news report
Online sites that can help individuals learn statistics
Good data sets
• Students must include the link to what they have found and
a short description/critique (followed by #epsy5261)
• Currently, this is an EXTRA CREDIT assignment
Project #2: SPSS Tutorials
• Project supported by a Technology Enhanced Learning
Grant (through the University of Minnesota Digital Media
Center)
• Collaborator: Yelena Yan
• Goals:
– To use real data sets
– To go beyond simply walking through steps and procedures; to
help students form connections among different topics and ideas
– To model (for students) how to think about and reason through
different problems
– To foster more of a sense of community in the online course by
providing students with opportunities to see and hear their
instructor
Rationale for
Statistics Tutorials
How to Use Statistics
Tutorials
Develop Research
Questions
Collect Data
Data Exploration
Entering data
Making Inferences
about Population
Confidence Intervals
for a Single Mean
One Sample t - test
Describing a Single
Quantitative Variable
Comparing groups on
a Single Quantitative
Variable
Two Sample t - test
Paired t - test
Correlation
Chi-square
Linear regression
Preliminary Feedback about SPSS Tutorials
• Students are watching the tutorials, often more than
once
• The tutorial with the most “hits” is about
confidence intervals
• Students like:
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The overall design and pacing of tutorials
Seeing and hearing the instructor
Accompanying handouts/data sets
Being able to pause and go back to sections over and over
• Students don’t like:
– Pacing (some say tutorials are slow and too long)
– Not having opportunities to stop and practice what they are learning
– Feeling as if tutorials will not be useful beyond the course
Some Lessons Learned
• It’s important to think about how you might “sell” your
students on the use of various technological tools in your
course
– Relate the use of such tools to the learning goals of the course
– Try to ensure students can access these tools and that they feel
comfortable using them
• Think carefully about the software you’ll need to use to
create different tools (such as tutorials) and about whether
the time and effort will be worth it in the long run
– If the statistical software you are using in the course is constantly
changing, is it worth it to create tutorials, or would well-labeled and
illustrated handouts suffice?
Incorporating GAISE in Online
Instruction: A Business Perspective
Sue B. Schou
Idaho State University
Email: schosue@isu.edu
Background
• Two semester undergraduate business
statistics courses
• Taught within the College of Business
• Use Minitab 15 statistical software
• Emphasis on writing and interpretation
• Use Moodle as the learning management
system (Adobe Presentations, Minitab video
instruction)
• Class size ranges from 30 to 40 students
Using Real Data
• Collect survey data from students in the
course using web survey tool
• Have students formulate questions
• Place the questions as written into the web
questionnaire
• Give students web address to respond
• Provide Excel spreadsheet for analysis
• Use the world SARS data (very skewed)—
could easily change to H1N1 flu data
– Source: Mathematics Teacher, September 2004
Using Real Data
• Projects
– Sampling from a real data source online
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www.dunes.com
www.autotrader.com
www.apartments.com
www.realtor.com
– First course uses data for hypothesis
testing
– Second course uses data for building a
multiple regression model
Projects in Online Setting
• Wiki
– Group assignment
– Can track each student’s contribution
– Saves all drafts
• Google Docs
– Students must set up using their gmail
accounts
– Allows editing
– Disadvantage in that instructor cannot see
work in progress
Discussion Forums in Moodle
Active Learning
• Grading rubric for discussions available
to students
• Assign groups for discussions initially
• First discussion forum: introduce yourself
to your group
• Use this environment to introduce myself
to the class
• Type I/Type II error
– http://www.intuitor.com/statistics/T1T2Errors.html
website includes an interactive applet
Discussion Forums in Moodle
Active Learning
• Require How to Lie with Statistics in
the first course
• Require Super Crunchers in the
second course
• Reading assignments then discussion
– Provide questions to direct the thought
process
– Example: wedding article
Problems with Forums
• Lack of student participation
– Solution is to make it percentage of overall grade
• Simply reiterating other students’ responses
– Use Q&A forum in Moodle
• Student low quality response
– Requires some encouragement from the
instructor to think more deeply
• Poor writing skills
– Include in grade and ensure is discussed in
grading rubric
Assessment
• Proctored exams (testing center, local
library, etc.)
– Mostly free response
– Some multiple choice (often from ARTIST
website)
• Unproctored portion to check Minitab skills
– Sometimes use this portion for interpretation
questions during proctored exams; submission
at exam center
– Sometimes require a memo that discusses the
results and gives recommendation for business;
submission online
Assessment
• End of semester proctored computer lab
exam
– First course requirement to ensure each student
is developing adequate technology skills
– Gives student raw data to input then analyze
– One hypothesis test from (one sample t-test, 2
sample t-test, paired t-test, ANOVA, one
proportion, two proportion, Test for equal
variance, and Chi-squared test of independence)
– Two additional problems from the remainder of
topics (probability, descriptive statistics, graphs,
etc.)
Promoting Conceptual
Learning in Online Classes
Patti B. Collings
Brigham Young University
Email: collingsp@stat.byu.edu
Who am I and What I Do
• Have taught online for 6 years
• Developed three versions of intro stat
– Independent Study: ≈1000 students per
year
– Hybrid (half in class and half out of class:
≈400 students per semester
– Hybrid (activity once a week): ≈500
students per semester
– All online (question/answer period once a
week): ≈250 students per semester
What I do (cont.)
• Used Blackboard in the past
• Now use Moodle
• Department chair mandated that online
course be exactly like in class course
Course Materials
• Textbook: Basic Practice of Statistics
by David S. Moore, 4th edition
• StatsPortal
– StatTutor lessons (tutorials)
– Pre- and Post-Quizzes for each chapter
– Applets
• Open labs
Assessment
• 15 question practice quiz and 15
question credit quiz due every
Monday, Wednesday and Friday
– Open book, open notes, open neighbor
– Immediate feedback
• Three proctored midterms
• Proctored final
Learning Outcomes
• Use ethical judgment to assess statistical
results in the honest search for truth.
• Communicate how statistics facilitates the
discovery, understanding, quantification
and modeling of truth about the world.
• Understand the importance of how data
should be collected, and how data
collection dictates the appropriate
statistical method and acceptable
inference.
Learning Outcomes
• Understand and communicate using
technical language about probability
and variation.
• Interpret and communicate the
outcomes of estimation and hypothesis
tests in the context of a problem.
Screen Shot of Moodle
Typical Lesson
Sample Quiz Question
• Identify when association is not causation.
Sample Quiz Question
• Give appropriate interpretations of statistical
values
• Real stories; real data
Sample Quiz Question
•Recognize type of study: experiment versus
observational study
•Recognize that causation can only be
concluded from experiment with randomization
Sample Quiz Question
•Recognize need for properly collected data for inference
Activity Screen Shot
Activity Screen Shot
Applet
• Understanding sum of squared
deviations
Applet
• Understanding relationship between a
and power
What I’ve learned
• Students need frequent deadlines
• Students only do what counts for credit
• Some students view hybrid classes as
an opportunity for less class time
• Students learn best if they work
together
• Changing student expectations is a
challenge
Graduate Online Instruction
Jamis Perrett
Texas A & M University
Email: jamis@stat.tamu.edu
Example 1: Online course in statistical
methods for Ph.D. nursing students
• 30 years experience as a nurse.
• 30+ years since last stats/math class.
• 30+ years since last college course.
• More mature, not in the education
mode, nervous about statistics, not
very familiar with computers.
Institutional Support
• Lots of new online programs
requesting introductory stats courses.
• Lots of webinars available for sharing
ideas.
• No one else was interested in teaching
online.
• Perception (true or false) that online
education is inferior.
What I do.
• Methods course. G1
• Pre-recorded multimedia presentation of
lectures. G5
• Workbook includes notes and assignments.
• Assignments a learning tool rather than an
assessment tool. G6
• Exams are online and computer-graded. G3,
G6
• Active discussion board. G4, G5
GAISE
G1: Literacy
• Online chats as needed. G4
G2:
G3:
G4:
G5:
G6:
and Thinking
Real Data
Conceptual Understanding
Active Learning
Use of Technology
Assessments
What I would like to do.
• Learning: Combination of pre-recorded
tutorials, interactive activities (applets),
computer-graded assignments and
self-graded quizzes. G1, G2, G3, G4, G5,
G6
• Assessment: project/report, proctored
exams. G1, G2, G3, G4, G5, G6
GAISE
G1: Literacy and Thinking
G2: Real Data
G3: Conceptual Understanding
G4: Active Learning
G5: Use of Technology
G6: Assessments
Example 2: Online statistics
for majors
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Hybrid course.
Campus group and online group.
MS stats majors.
Full-time employees in industry.
Many already use stats daily.
Computer-savvy.
Institutional Support
• Assistant/grader.
• Departmental priority.
What I do.
• Campus group taught as usual. G?
• Daily classes recorded.
• Online group watches recorded class that
evening after work.
• Weekly live online interaction (virtual
office hour). G4
• Assignments and exams same for all
students. G6
• Proctors required for all exams. G6
GAISE
G1: Literacy and Thinking
G2: Real Data
G3: Conceptual Understanding
G4: Active Learning
G5: Use of Technology
G6: Assessments
What I would like to do
• Learning: Combination of pre-recorded
tutorials, interactive activities (applets),
computer-graded assignments and
self-graded quizzes. G1, G2, G3, G4, G5,
G6
• Assessment: project/report, proctored
exams. G1, G2, G3, G4, G5, G6
GAISE
G1: Literacy and Thinking
G2: Real Data
G3: Conceptual Understanding
G4: Active Learning
G5: Use of Technology
G6: Assessments
Challenges
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Assuring exam integrity.
Resources: Time, effort, cost.
Instructors.
Institutional constraints.
Presentation Posted
http://cobhomepages.cob.isu.edu/schosue/jsm2009.htm