Active learning of statistics: a case study

Abstract

Research at the Open University has investigated students' learning of statistical concepts and how information technology can be effectively used to support this process. Previous empirical work has looked at psychology students' misconceptions relating to correlation and how computer-based learning environments can be used to address these. This paper reports on the findings from a qualitative study that investigated students' learning collaboratively from a multimedia application called ActivStats.

The contribution of computer‐based activities to understanding statistics

“…There has been little empirical work that has specifically investigated whether particular computer‐based activities in multimedia resources contribute to students' understanding of introductory statistical topics. Accordingly, by building of previous work (Morris & Scanlon, 2000), the study described in this paper was designed to investigate whether computer‐based activities involving the direct manipulation of data on graphical displays contribute to students' understanding of correlations and measures of central tendency.…”

“…Previous work has suggested that computer‐based activities that provide linked multiple representations involving the direct manipulations of graphical displays might be used by psychology students to enhance their understanding of introductory statistical concepts (Morris & Scanlon, 2000). It was therefore unexpected that the activities in ActivStats contributed to students' understanding of measures of central tendency, but not also to their understanding of correlations.…”

“…The multimedia learning resource ActivStats provides learner activities for introductory statistics. On the basis of findings from a previous investigation (Morris & Scanlon, 2000), computer‐based learner activities that make use of linked representations were selected from this resource. Participants in the ActivStats group therefore completed the following activities:…”

“…As described above, although previous research studies have involved the evaluation of systems and have found that particular systems can facilitate the learning of statistical concepts, there has been very little research that has invest‐igated what aspects of those systems (such as multimedia demonstrations or dynamically linked representations) contribute to students' understanding of statistical concepts. Morris & Scanlon (2000) report on a qualitative study that began to investigate this issue by involving psychology students using a multimedia resource called ActivStats (Velleman 1997). This empirical work was designed to investigate whether students found particular computer‐based activities valuable in terms of the learning process and involved pairs of students who were asked to work cooperatively on a series of activities that covered correlations (Morris & Scanlon, 2000).…”

“…Morris & Scanlon (2000) report on a qualitative study that began to investigate this issue by involving psychology students using a multimedia resource called ActivStats (Velleman 1997). This empirical work was designed to investigate whether students found particular computer‐based activities valuable in terms of the learning process and involved pairs of students who were asked to work cooperatively on a series of activities that covered correlations (Morris & Scanlon, 2000). The findings of this small scale investigation suggested that students found it valuable to make use of activities involving representations that were dynamically linked.…”