Education Commons^™

Making Statistics Matter: Using Self-Data To Improve Statistics Learning, Jeffrey L. Thayne

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Research has demonstrated that well into their undergraduate and even graduate education, learners often struggle to understand basic statistical concepts, fail to see their relevance in their personal and professional lives, and often treat them as little more than mere mathematics exercises. Undergraduate learners often see statistical concepts as means to passing exams, completing required courses, and moving on with their degree, and not as instruments of inquiry that can illuminate their world in new and useful ways.

This study explored ways help learners in an undergraduate learning context to treat statistical inquiry as mattering in a practical research context, …

An Exploration Into How Physical Activity Data-Recording Devices Could Be Used In Computer-Supported Data Investigations, Victor R. Lee, Maneksha Dumont

Instructional Technology and Learning Sciences Faculty Publications

There is a great potential opportunity to use portable physical activity monitoring devices as data collection tools for educational purposes. Using one such device, we designed and implemented a weeklong workshop with high school students to test the utility of such technology. During that intervention, students performed data investigations of physical activity that culminated in the design and implementation of their own studies. In this paper, we explore some of the mathematical thinking that took place through a series of vignettes of a pair of students engaged in analyzing some of their own activity data. A personal connection to the …

Results From The First World-Wide Web Survey, James Pitkow, Mimi Recker

Instructional Technology and Learning Sciences Faculty Publications

The explosion of World-Wide Web (WWW) across the Internet is staggering, both in terms of number of users and the amount of activity. However, to date, no reliable characterization exists of WWW users. In this paper, we report results from a survey that was posted on the Web for a month, in January of 1994. There were several goals motivating our survey. First, we wished to demonstrate a proof of concept for WWW technologies as a useful survey medium. Second, we wanted to bet a-test the design and content of surveys dealing with the Web. Third, as mentioned, we hoped …