February 2012
-
Randomness
Students really don’t get randomness. This is the classic Trick Coin Flip question — I have a trick coin that either comes up heads a bit more than tails, or tails a bit more than heads [They sell trick coins both ways, apparently]. I don’t know whether this particular trick coin tends towards heads or Continue reading
-
I want to do this in a class….
What a neat way of combining two textbooks to get a novel course design (which meshes with current theories of interleaving): In an effort to maximize spacing and encoding variability, Robert Bjork once taught an honors introductory psychology course twice in one term. Up to the point of the midterm, the basic concepts of introductory Continue reading
-
Divided Attention During Lecture
I’ve been having some fun reading Bjork and his followers on elements of instruction. It’s good stuff! This comes from Successful Lecturing: Presenting Information in Ways That Engage Effective Processing by Patricia Ann de Winstanley & Robert A. Bjork: In addition to its having a strong negative impact on encoding, divided attention has been shown Continue reading
-
Concept Inventories and Dan Meyer’s Linear Modeling Exercise
I’ve talked a bit in the past about good concept inventory questions — questions that address difficult conceptual questions but have black and white answers and don’t require any special vocabulary to answer. Dan Meyer’s Linear Modeling exercise [PDF] is a good example. The first question has a specific answer, and answering it requires the right Continue reading
-
Comparing Electoral Behavior
From the Utne Reader, in an article showing that we ” are segregating [our]selves politically and geographically” in the U.S. : “In 1992, 38 percent of Americans lived in counties decided by landslide elections; by 2004, that figure was 48 percent.” One thing that jumps out at me immediately is that elections are very hard to Continue reading
-
Fireside Tutorials and Punk Economics
What do we call this genre of videos, these informal explanations by Khan Academy, RSA:Animate, Common Craft, Vi Hart, and others — these sit across the desk from you and talk things through? I have no idea. But I’m fascinated with the form, and how rethinking video this way makes a lecture seem more like Continue reading
-
Obesity and C-Section StatLit Materials
Obesity and C-Section StatLit Materials Some stuff from Thursday’s class. Here’s the facilitator’s notes as well, if you want to run this in your own class. It’s a sort of “case-study lite” approach. I gave the students the following in a packet: An article talking about research which showed people born by C-section are at Continue reading
-
Hill’s nine criteria for causal association
Sir Austin Bradford Hill’s classic article on the characteristics of a causal relationship is well worth a read, and is still one of the most concise lists of what to look for in any research you read. Here’s a summary of what helps us make the leap from association to causation: Strength (is the risk Continue reading
-
Gallup 1946
I knew about the poll in 1936 that changed everything — where the two million responses collated by the Literary Digest were dead wrong while the 50,000 responses scientifically selected by George Gallup were right. If you need a Wikipedia refresher on that, here you go: In 1936, [Gallup’s] new organization achieved national recognition by Continue reading
-
Problems of Definition: Elsevier’s Prices
The recent boycott of Elsevier provides us with a great quote for use in a statistical literacy class. People are boycotting for a number of reasons, particularly because of the high cost of the “bundles” Elsevier sells. Claiming that their journals are some of the cheapest in the industry, an Elsevier rep states: “Over the past 10 Continue reading
Hapgood 