PME Working Group for Stochastics Teaching and Learning
<http://www.ugr.es/~batanero/pmegroup>
Letter No 13 - May 1998
Dear Friends,
This Newsletter contains 6 items.
1. List of Members on our Web Page—Call for Contributions
2. Working Group at PME 22, Stellenbosch
3. Other Stochastics Activities at the Conference
4. Planning for the Proposed Book. Main Item
5. Proposal for an Electronic Data Base.
6. PME 1999
7. Next Newsletter
1. List of Members on our Web Page—Call for Contributions
Our Web Page is now up and running. The address is at the top of this Newsletter. A number of members have now contributed their biographies. If you have not done so please send details to Juan Godino <jgodino@goliat.ugr.es>. Provide your:
name
institution
e-mail address
URL of personal web page
and a brief (50 - 60 words) description of your interests
2. Working Group at PME 22, Stellenbosch, near Cape Town12-17 July 97 <http://www.sun.ac.za/pme22>
There will be three meetings of the Working Group
1. Monday 1400 - 1530 General Business
2. Tuesday 1400 - 1530 Book Project (KT)
3. Thursday 1400 - 1530 Data Base Project (JT)
Agenda for First Meeting
1. Welcome and background to the Working Group (JT)
2 Brief self-introductions by those present
3. Reports
Activities since last year’s meeting (JT)
Web Site (JG)
ICOTS 1998 (KT)
International Study Group (CB)
CIBEM Stochastics Group (Venezuela) (CB)
Stochastics Papers from 1997 (JT)
Book Project (KT) - handout available
Data Base Project (JT) - handout available
4. Brief reports of members’ work
Andrew Ahlgren
Other Contributions welcome
5. Future Activities
CERME 1998 (JG)
PME 1999 Israel (JT)
ISI Meeting Helsinki 1999 ()
Japanese Meetings 2000 ()
The members of this Working Group list that we know will be attending are:
Andy Ahlgren (USA)
Carmen Batanero (Spain)Dave Pratt (UK)
Claude Gaulin (Canada)
Michael Glencross(South Africa)
Juan Godino (Spain)
Avigail Hartman (Israel)
Dave Pratt (UK)
David Reid (Canada)
John Truran (Australia)
Kath Truran (Australia)
Apologies: Anne Hawkins (UK)
If you plan to attend, please let us know.
3. Other Stochastics Activities at the Conference
Research Forum --- “Learning and Teaching Data Handling”. Co-ordinator Paul Laridon, University of Witwatersrand, Johannesberg.
“Graphing as a Computer-mediated Tool”
Janet Ainley, Elena Nardi, Dave Pratt (Warwick, UK) Reactor: Ricardo Nemirovsky (USA)
“Building the Meaning of Statistical Association through Data Analysis Activities”
Carmen Batanero, Juan Godino (Granada, Spain) & Antonio Estapa (Jaen, Spain) Reactor: Michael Glencross (South Africa)
Details of the papers which have been accepted have not yet been released, though they have been decided. These will be published in the next newsletter.
4. Planning for the Proposed Book.
The following is a draft based on comments from members and other thinking. Comments will be welcome from all readers, preferably before 7 June.
Draft for discussion within the PME Stochastics Working Group and the International Study Group for Research on Learning Probability and Statistics
"TEACHING AND LEARNING PROBABILITY & STATISTICS:
IMPLICATIONS FROM RESEARCH"
(A joint project for producing a handbook on statistical education from a research
perspective)
Kath Truran, University of South Australia; John Truran, University of Adelaide, Carmen Bantanero, University of Granada....
Background:
The increasing interest in research into statistical education is noticeable in the international conferences, specific books and journals, and the existence of professional associations, and research groups. This interest reflects two important changes in educational practice. One is the common trend towards teaching probability and statistics in primary and secondary schools, the other is the large growth of "in service" statistics courses at tertiary institutions. On top of these curriculum changes there is now also the opportunity for teaching methods to change significantly by using of increasingly available electronic aids.
All of these changes have highlighted limitations in our understanding of good pedagogic practice and of the sense which students actually make of the courses which they study, and have therefore, pointed out the very important need for further research into statistical education. A particular problem is that research is currently being carried out from a variety of research fields (such as Psychology, Education, Mathematics Education and Statistics). Consequently research results are widely spread in different journals and conference proceedings and many of them have not had adequate diffusion. Some work from psychology does not reach many current workers, and work published in a language different from English do not always have a general diffusion. There have been previously published bibliographies and survey chapters or books, and some of them are also certainly good summaries of the field (e.g. Shaughnessy, 1992, Hawkins et al, 1991, Shaughnessy et al., 1996,...) but they make no claim to be comprehensive. On the other hand, the amount of research which has already been done is probably sufficient to warrant the production of a book addressing major issues, particularly the relationship between research and teaching practice, in what is a relatively new topic in primary and secondary curricula and in many university majors.
The idea of producing a handbook, which summarises research on statistical education, and addresses the educational implication from its results is a consequence of the PME Stochastics Working Group initial work at Lahti in 1997. This group was established in the 1996 PME Meeting (Valencia) by John Truran (University of Adelaide), Kath Truran (University of South Australia), and Carmen Batanero (University of Granada) with the aim of preparing material which would assist in disseminating research findings and encouraging more research in the field. It was specifically intended that the Group would not be restricted to regular attenders at PME Conferences, nor to people who were fluent in English. To further these ends an electronic circulation list has been set up, currently with about 40 members.
In the first meeting of the group at PME 21 (Lahti, 1977) the idea of planning to prepare a general book containing a review of research done on the teaching and learning of stochastics arose. It was intended that this would be directed at researchers, statistical educators and teachers at all levels, and would address pedagogic issues from a psychological research background. It is planned that this book will be assembled in the traditional way of calling for offers of chapters, and co-ordinating the chapters into a meaningful form. Most work will be done through e-mail communication. Some preliminary thinking about structure and critical issues was done within the Lahti meetings, and the present project have been produced by the group co-ordinator to be circulated within the PME group for initial response. Once agreement has been reached on the basic aims and structure, then there will be a general call for chapter authors and a publisher will be sought.
Content, Format, and Editorial Process
The principal aim is to obtain a scholarly, critical assessment of current literature directed specifically to summarising the main psychological and educational research in the area and to linking research findings with classroom implications in a way which increases significantly the body of pedagogical knowledge. A second aim is to provide new researchers with a starting point to research literature in statistical education and with a reasonable research agenda.
The intended audience are new and current researchers in statistical education in different areas, such as Mathematics Education, Psychology and Education. It would be also directed to statisticians interested in the problems of statistical education, as well as to university lecturers and teacher educators. The book could also be useful to secondary and primary teachers of statistics in English speaking countries. The book will be attractively presented, in a style acnot only to researchers in the field, but to the wider community of statistical educators, including curriculum developers and statisticians.
Collaboration between researchers in different countries and different research fields will be encouraged.
It will be a refereed book. The editorial panel will be responsible of organising the refereeing process with the help of authors and some external experts. It will be also responsible to finding a publisher.
The production of the book can be considerably simplified if all the authors prepare their chapters according to some format guidelines. This will be proposed by the editorial team to assure the homogeneity of chapters and to simplify the editorial process.
Book Structure
In the following we propose a possible initial structure and list of chapters. This structure could be changed during the process of producing the book, if necessary.
The editorial team would also be willing to accept any suggestions for specific chapters, in case the proposal makes it clear that there is sufficient previous research on the proposed topic and that the chapter contributes to the general project.
Introduction
Some historical, philosophical and epistemological considerations
The stochastics curriculum at schools and universities
Learning theories and teaching methodologies in statistical education
Teaching and Learning Probability
Combinatorics
Cognitive development of the idea of probability
Comparison and assignment of elementary probability
Conditional probability, independence
Heuristics and biases in probabilistic judgements
Subjective probability
Probability distributions, convergence
Computers and the teaching of probability
Teaching and learning statistics
Collecting and Organising data
Graphing
Averages and dispersion
Association, and correlation
Fitting models to data and regression
Sampling and estimation
Hypothesis testing
Experimental design
Computers and the teaching of statistics
Cross-sectional Themes
Textbooks and curricular materials
Students' Styles and Attitudes Towards Stochastics in the Classroom
Assessment of Stochastic Understanding
Preparing Teachers to Teach Stochastics
Using the History of Stochastics in the Classroom
Cross-cultural studies
The chapters are intended to establish a broad background regarding statistical education and its implication on educational practice. The following are examples of questions the book could attempt to answer.
How stochastic reasoning evolves through childhood and adolescence? What are differing conceptions about specific stochastic concept in students at different ages?
What are the students' beliefs and attitudes towards statistics? What contributes to students' effective learning and problem solving?
What are the main difficulties in the learning process of particular concepts? What are the cognitive and metacognitive skill of good statistical thinkers? How can they be developed?
How does stochastic reasoning develop in everyday activities? How is stochastic reasoning needed and used (or misused) in professional work?
How the stochastic curriculum is organised at different levels and in different countries?
Chapter Structure
Each chapter should address a relevant part of statistical education and will present a critical survey of the main previous research, its methodology, findings and limitations, especially those concerned with psychology and mathematics education.
The chapter length will be limited to a maximum of 10,000 words. Language will be accessible to facilitate its effective use by the target readers. Using schemes, diagrams, examples of assessment tasks and students' Responses will be encouraged to facilitate understanding.
In the first section of each chapter the authors will introduce the key questions the chapter aims to address.
The final section will suggest some teaching implications, including a summary of known cognitive and pedagogical difficulties. Potential areas for future research will also be included.
References:
Each author/group of authors would consider carefully which references to select, to cover the main contributions to the topics without listing an excessive number of references.
The editors will propose a standard system of referencing, such as APA reference style, to be used in the reference list and in quotations to references.
Author biography
A brief paragraph (3-6 sentences) will be included for each author in a special section which will be placed at the beginning of the book, describing the current position and background relevant to the chapter.
Abstract:
Each author should prepare an abstract of about 100-200 words. This will be used for promotional materials and for the introductory chapter.
Publication schedule
Producing a handbook on Statistical Education is an important project that needs sufficient time to be planned and carried out. One of the main concerns of the editorial team should be to get an international panel of authors and referees, to assure the final quality of the book. Below we include some tentative dead lines:
January 1998: Sending the Project to the PME Working Group and the International Study Group for Research into Learning Probability and Statistics by e-mail.
February-June 1998: Internal discussion of this proposal by e-mail and list of people interested in participating in the project.
June-July 1998: Final decisions about the project: Editorial team, general book structure and orientation, etc. The final editorial team will be responsible to find a publisher, getting funds, organising the refereeing process and supervising the production of the book.
September 1988: First call for papers, including an estimated publication schedule. To assure a wide diffusion, the dead line for receiving the first version of submitted articles will be April 1999 or later. After the first revision, notifications to authors for a possible acceptance or rejection of submitted articles will be sent. The final acceptance of articles will be notified after the second revision. The scheduled timetable will assure to the authors sufficient revision time to prepare the second draft and final papers.
Expression of interest in the Project
If you are interested in this project and are willing to contribute to the discussion and improvement of this proposal, please send an e-mail message to one of the co-ordinators. A list of potential contributors to the project will be included in the next Newsletter, as well as a summary of all the received comments and suggestions.
Kath Truran
Magill Campus, University of South Australia
St. Bernard's Road, Magill 5072, South Australia
(fax + 618 8302 4732)
<Kath.Truran@unisa.edu.au>
John Truran <jtruran@arts.adelaide.edu.au>
Carmen Batanero <batanero@goliat.ugr.es>
5. Proposal for an electronic Data Base.
Details of this proposal were sent out in Newsletter No 12. I have had some volunteers, but not as many I should have liked, so please consider offering to help.
6. PME 1999
At our meeting in 1999 one session will be devoted to a mini-forum on “The Understanding of Data-Handling”, which will be a follow-on from this year’s major forum.
We are also proposing to the Programme Committee that they hold a Research Forum in 1999 on “The Understanding of Probability”. This would be co-ordinated by Dani Ben-Zvi (Weizmann Institute, Israel), who is joining our committee. We are giving advance notice of this request, so that any member who might want to make a submission has plenty of notice, should the proposal be accepted. Submissions are due much earlier than for normal PME papers.
7. Next Newsletter
This is planned for early June. Please send material for inclusion by 1 June. Many of us will be one the road/in the air from about 18 June.
John Truran <jtruran@arts.adelaide.edu.au>
Kath Truran <Kath.Truran@unisa.edu.au>
Carmen Batanero <batanero@goliat.ugr.es>
Web page <http://www.ugr.es/~batanero/pmegroup>