STATISTICS 135
About the Course
2 lectures, 2 recitations, and 1 problem solving session or online quiz per week
5 credit course
Statistics 135 makes use of the “Statistical Buffet” that caters to individual students’ learning preferences and styles. The students you have on the first one or two days of class will not be your students for the remainder of the quarter. On the first day of recitation, students take the learning styles quiz online to find out what their ideal method of learning is. Their scores suggest whether they should enroll in the active lecture (which is more interactive and uses more practice problems) or the reflective lecture (literally a traditional lecture style). Then students decide whether to enroll in the sensing recitation (more hands on, like spinning a roulette wheel) or the intuitor recitation (more computer applets, such as simulations of spinning a roulette wheel with the click of a mouse). Then students take the study skills questionnaire to determine whether they would do best with the in-class problem solving (for more unmotivated students and group learners) or the online quizzes (for highly motivated and independent learners). Students fill out a course contract and are then told which rooms to go to for class. The Statistical Buffet gives students the opportunity to learn in an environment best suited to their needs.
Typical Student Profile
Statistics 135 students are primarily from the Humanities. There are many students from the Allied Medical majors (including nursing), education, and art. The course is required before students can apply to the School of Communication.
Lecture
- Structure of the course:
- 5 out-of-class quizzes or in-class problem solving sessions.
- 3 in-class lecture activities.
- 2 midterms.
- 1 final during finals week.
- 8 graded homework assignments.
- One 8.5x11 inches sheet of notes for midterm.
- Two 8.5x11 inches sheets of notes for final.
- Practice exams.
- Topics covered:
- Sampling and Experiments.
- Describing distributions (graphical and numerical summaries).
- Measurement.
- Probability (addition rule only) and Simpson’s Paradox.
- Sampling distributions for means and proportions.
- Confidence intervals and hypothesis testing for means and proportions.
- Correlation and Regression.
- Challenging concepts:
- Hypothesis testing.
- Use lots of examples in lecture as well as in recitation to make it easier for the student to understand these concepts.
- Things that are taught differently from other courses:
- Law of Averages instead of Law of Large Numbers (as taught in Statistics 145).
- Don’t use the t-distribution for means of small samples and unknown population standard deviation (as compared to Statistics 145) for hypothesis testing and confidence intervals.
- Texts used:
- Statistics Concepts and Controversies (6th edition) by David Moore and William Notz (required).
- Lab and Activities Supplement for Moore's Statistics Concepts and Controversies by Dennis Pearl and Roger Woodard (required).
- Notes:
- Each lecturer creates his/her own notes.
- Course notes get posted weekly by the lecturer on the course website.
- Statistical software:
- Data Desk.
- Course management website:
- Grade dependent on attendance:
- There are points allotted to the lecture activities.
- There are points allotted to the problem solving activities.
- Helpful tips for new TAs:
- Get in touch with TAs who have served as a lecturer for this course.
- Read through the notes a couple of days before you teach the material; this gives you enough time to contact the course coordinator and have your doubts cleared.
- Become familiar with the textbook.
- Try different approaches for teaching hard concepts; for example, the “picture” seems to work better than mathematical formulae for finding p-values.
- 5 out-of-class quizzes or in-class problem solving sessions.
- 3 in-class lecture activities.
- 2 midterms.
- 1 final during finals week.
- 8 graded homework assignments.
- One 8.5x11 inches sheet of notes for midterm.
- Two 8.5x11 inches sheets of notes for final.
- Practice exams.
- Sampling and Experiments.
- Describing distributions (graphical and numerical summaries).
- Measurement.
- Probability (addition rule only) and Simpson’s Paradox.
- Sampling distributions for means and proportions.
- Confidence intervals and hypothesis testing for means and proportions.
- Correlation and Regression.
- Hypothesis testing.
- Use lots of examples in lecture as well as in recitation to make it easier for the student to understand these concepts.
- Law of Averages instead of Law of Large Numbers (as taught in Statistics 145).
- Don’t use the t-distribution for means of small samples and unknown population standard deviation (as compared to Statistics 145) for hypothesis testing and confidence intervals.
- Statistics Concepts and Controversies (6th edition) by David Moore and William Notz (required).
- Lab and Activities Supplement for Moore's Statistics Concepts and Controversies by Dennis Pearl and Roger Woodard (required).
- Each lecturer creates his/her own notes.
- Course notes get posted weekly by the lecturer on the course website.
- Data Desk.
- There are points allotted to the lecture activities.
- There are points allotted to the problem solving activities.
- Get in touch with TAs who have served as a lecturer for this course.
- Read through the notes a couple of days before you teach the material; this gives you enough time to contact the course coordinator and have your doubts cleared.
- Become familiar with the textbook.
- Try different approaches for teaching hard concepts; for example, the “picture” seems to work better than mathematical formulae for finding p-values.
Recitation:
- Structure of recitation:
- 13 Labs.
- 3 peer reviews (before exams).
- Grade dependent on recitation:
- Not explicitly, but labs are difficult for most students to complete on their own.
- Some labs compile data as a class, so those cannot be made up unless the student gets the data from a classmate.
- Things that are taught differently from other courses:
- Law of Averages instead of Law of Large Numbers.
- Don’t use the t-distribution for means of small samples and unknown population standard deviation (hypothesis testing and confidence intervals).
- Challenging concepts:
- Hypothesis testing.
- Use lots of examples in lecture as well as in recitation to make it easier for the student to understand these concepts.
- Helpful tips for new TAs:
- Attend lecture in your first quarter teaching any course. This is the best way to really know what’s being taught and when.
- Become familiar with the textbook.
- Talk to experienced TAs. They can tell you what specific problems to expect when teaching a particular topic.
- Plan ahead.
- Sometimes it helps to very briefly go over topics, concepts and ideas before you work on problems that implement these. Students may have forgotten the concepts from lecture and may need a little “refreshing.”
- 13 Labs.
- 3 peer reviews (before exams).
- Not explicitly, but labs are difficult for most students to complete on their own.
- Some labs compile data as a class, so those cannot be made up unless the student gets the data from a classmate.
- Law of Averages instead of Law of Large Numbers.
- Don’t use the t-distribution for means of small samples and unknown population standard deviation (hypothesis testing and confidence intervals).
- Hypothesis testing.
- Use lots of examples in lecture as well as in recitation to make it easier for the student to understand these concepts.
- Attend lecture in your first quarter teaching any course. This is the best way to really know what’s being taught and when.
- Become familiar with the textbook.
- Talk to experienced TAs. They can tell you what specific problems to expect when teaching a particular topic.
- Plan ahead.
- Sometimes it helps to very briefly go over topics, concepts and ideas before you work on problems that implement these. Students may have forgotten the concepts from lecture and may need a little “refreshing.”