An Innovative Classroom Approach for Developing Critical Thinkers in the Introductory Statistics Course

Cheng, Sherri; Ferris, Mark; Perolio, Jessica

doi:10.1080/00031305.2017.1305293

Cited by 6 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 20 publications

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“…Bensley et al (2010) report medium-level scores on one of their subscales for critical thinking, i.e., the argument analysis scale, at the start of a semester prior to introducing different instructional methods to enhance critical thinking in a research methods course for psychology students. Cheng et al (2018) report high baseline scores on four single items tapping into four dimensions of critical thinking at the start of introductory statistics classes for students from various academic disciplines. The current results open interesting new avenues of research into domain-specific critical thinking in higher education and its development, both within and between academic disciplines, and across cultures.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…While methods for measuring statistics-related critical thinking differ across studies as does the teaching methods evaluated results are also ambiguous, as some find no effect of the purposely designed teaching compared to the usual teaching without clarifying whether this means there was an effect or no effect for both groups (Goode et al, 2018;Setambah et al, 2019), and others a positive effect for only the students receiving the purposely designed teaching and no change for the students receiving the usual teaching (e.g., Bensley et al, 2010). On the same note, one study evaluating just the effect of a purposely designed teaching method in itself found this to enhance the statistics-related critical thinking of the students (Cheng et al, 2018). The lack of increase in the statistics-related critical thinking in the current study is thus only supported by Bensley et al (2010), who did not find any change for their control group of psychology students.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…They found that after 10 weeks there was no significant difference, while there was weak evidence for a difference favoring the experimental groups after a further 8 weeks. Lastly, Cheng et al (2018) showed how the critical thinking of undergraduate students taking introductory statistics classes within various degree programs increased across semesterlong courses incorporating assignments, in-class discussion, and Socratic dialog. Cheng et al (2018) designed a domain-specific rubric with four dimensions related to critical thinking to be scored by domain-specialists and as well as a student selfreport survey to assess students' perceptions of improvement in critical thinking.…”

Section: Development Of Students' Statistics-related Critical Thinkingmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Exploring First Semester Changes in Domain-Specific Critical Thinking

2022

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Critical thinking is a common aim for higher education students, often described as general competencies to be acquired through entire programs as well as domain-specific skills to be acquired within subjects. The aim of the study was to investigate whether statistics-specific critical thinking changed from the start of the first semester to the start of the second semester of a two-semester statistics course, where the curriculum contains learning objectives and assessment criteria related to critical thinking. The brief version of the Critical Thinking scale (CTh) from the Motivated Strategies of Learning Questionnaire addresses the core aspects of critical thinking common to three different definitions of critical thinking. Students rate item statements in relation to their statistics course using a frequency scale: 1 = never, 2 = rarely, 3 = sometimes, 4 = often, and 5 = always. Participants were two consecutive year-cohorts of full-time Bachelor of Psychology students taking a two-semester long statistics course placed in the first two semesters. Data were collected in class with a paper-pencil survey 1 month into their first semester and again 1 month into the second. The study sample consisted of 336 students (ncohort 1 = 166, ncohort 2 = 170) at baseline, the follow-up was completed by 270 students with 165 students who could be matched to their baseline response. To investigate the measurement properties of the CTh scale, item analysis by the Rasch model was conducted on baseline data and subsequently on follow-up data. Change scores at the group level were calculated as the standardized effect size (ES) (i.e., the difference between baseline and follow-up scores relative to the standard deviation of the baseline scores). Data fitted Rasch models at baseline and follow-up. The targeting of the CTh scale to the student sample was excellent at both timepoints. Absolute individual changes on the CTh ranged from −5.3 to 5.1 points, thus showing large individual changes in critical thinking. The overall standardized effect was small and negative (−0.12), with some variation in student strata defined by, gender, age, perceived adequacy of math knowledge to learn statistics, and expectation to need statistics in future employment.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Development Of Students' Statistics-related Critical Thinkingmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Exploring First Semester Changes in Domain-Specific Critical Thinking

2022

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“…Together, all four components must be no longer than 500 words—the common length for “short” papers recommended in an introductory statistics course (eg, Cheng et al, ). This restriction not only trains students to be concise in their writing but also limits the amount of reading for the instructor.…”

Section: Assignment Setupmentioning

confidence: 99%

Improving student outcomes in high‐enrollment statistics classes with the structured writing approach

Batova

Ruediger

2019

Teaching Statistics

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“…For example, the Guidelines for Assessment and Instruction in Statistics Education College Report (GAISE 2016) provides a range of recommendations to improve students' statistical thinking and literacy in the teaching of statistics in higher education. Correspondingly, over the past 20 years, research in cognitive psychology has garnered increased attention regarding techniques that can readily be Cheng, Ferris, and Perolio 2018;Nielsen, Bean, and Larsen 2018;Songsore and White 2018). A less developed area of concentration is the teaching and learning of statistics in graduation education.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Flipping Statistics Courses in Graduate Education: Integration of Cognitive Psychology and Technology

Immekus

2019

Journal of Statistics Education

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This article examines the integration of cognitive psychology research and technology within existing frameworks of statistics course design and implementation for a sequence of flipped graduate-level courses. Particular focus is the use of the principles of spacing and retrieval practice within the flipped classroom format as strategic approaches to curriculum design and instructional delivery within and across courses. The reporting of student perceptions regarding their engagement in learning, statistical thinking and practice, and course components that contributed to their learning serves to shed light on ways educators can bridge theory to practice in statistics education at the graduate-level.

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An Innovative Classroom Approach for Developing Critical Thinkers in the Introductory Statistics Course

Cited by 6 publications

References 20 publications

Exploring First Semester Changes in Domain-Specific Critical Thinking

Exploring First Semester Changes in Domain-Specific Critical Thinking

Improving student outcomes in high‐enrollment statistics classes with the structured writing approach

Flipping Statistics Courses in Graduate Education: Integration of Cognitive Psychology and Technology

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