STATISTICS EDUCATION RESEARCH JOURNAL

ADHD AND ACADEMIC PERFORMANCE IN A POST-SECONDARY STATISTICS COURSE: MEDIATING FACTORS

SIGAL LEVY, YELENA STUKALIN — Tue, 17 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Attention-Deficit Hyperactive Disorder (ADHD) is a widely spread phenomenon affecting learning abilities and performance. The aim of the research is to test the mechanism linking ADHD with statistics test performance. We found a significant indirect path linking the ADHD diagnosis and the final grade. ADHD was linked to lower self-efficacy, leading to a more negative attitude towards statistics and lower grades. While treating ADHD is beyond the ability of a course lecturer, its adverse consequences such as impaired performance, can be addressed in the classroom setting. Lecturers should be encouraged to take steps towards increasing the self-efficacy and positive perception of statistics of their students. This may help improve the performance of students with ADHD without having to directly treat the disorder.

EFFECT OF STUDENTS' ETHNIC AND CULTURAL BACKGROUNDS ON THE SUCCESS OF PRACTICAL PROJECTS WITHIN STATISTICS AND DATA SCIENCE COURSES

ANNA KHALEMSKY, YELENA STUKALIN — Tue, 17 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The article describes the inclusive perspective of instruction of multi-stage practical projects in undergraduate non-STEM statistics and data mining courses at an academic college in Israel. The student population is highly diverse, comprising individuals from various cultural and ethnic groups. The study examines the impact of diversity on students' choices of project topics, database selection, methodological choice, research question formulation, and results interpretation. The research findings can contribute to educators and institutions striving to develop inclusive and effective teaching approaches in multicultural learning environments. Using a cluster analysis, we identified five groups of students, each exhibiting unique characteristics and varied perceptions of the learning process. These findings highlight the importance of tailored approaches.

ADDRESSING WATER SCARCITY THROUGH STATISTICAL INQUIRY IN TEACHER EDUCATION

JANIELLY VERBISCK, MARILENA BITTAR, BERTA BARQUERO, MARIANNA BOSCH — Tue, 17 Dec 2024 00:00:00 +0000

This article presents the design and implementation of a study and research path for teacher education (SRP-TE) based on the Anthropological Theory of the Didactic. The goal is to analyze this teacher education proposal for inclusive statistics education aiming to overcome constraints derived from the phenomenon of the transparency of data treatment. The proposal starts with a newspaper report about the loss of water resources in Brazil and questions the data supporting it. The study focuses on one of the participating teachers from a disadvantaged region in the Northeast, where she worked in a rural school with few resources and poor infrastructure. The course helped her implement an inquiry activity with her sixth-grade students and mobilize digital resources for data visualization and graph representations. This case study contributed to analyzing how the SRP-TE promoted teachers’ professional development and provided elements for teaching inclusive statistics.

EXPLORING THE PLIGHT OF THE HONEYBEE: USING DATA SENSORS AND CODAP TO SUPPORT EMERGING BILINGUAL LEARNERS IN REASONING ABOUT BIG STATISTICAL IDEAS

AISLING LEAVY, MAIREAD HOURIGAN, MICHELLE FITZPATRICK — Tue, 14 Jan 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Children require access to high-quality statistics education to develop the skills to participate in a technological and data-reliant workforce. This study consisted of a five-lesson integrated STEM unit designed to develop the statistical literacy of 62 6th-grade (11–12 years old) emerging bilingual (EB) learners. Learning was situated in the study of the honeybee, utilising innovative technologies to gather data and support data visualisation and analysis. Lesson study was used to design lessons targeting understandings of distribution, centre, variability, data comparison, informal measures of association and informal inference. This paper reports on the data comparison lesson. It reveals the influential role of digital technologies in highlighting the relevance of statistics in understanding societal issues and developing students’ statistical agency. This qualitative study also revealed that the development of statistical understanding was supported by the use of inclusive pedagogies guided by the principles of universal design and the incorporation of data analysis technologies.