Welcome to the STAtistics Zone

(Statistics, Period D)
Web address shortcut for this page: http://www.modd.net/89stat

Are you nervous when you see NCWEE? concerned when you see CIRC? perturbed when you see PBC? Visit Mr. Hansen’s fabled abbreviations page to make sense of those cryptic markings you see on your papers.

Schedule at a Glance (see archives for older entries) Written assignments should follow the HW guidelines. Recurring Assignment: Each Wednesday through the first week of December, there may be a discussion or a graded open-notes quiz on the “Quick Study” column in the previous day’s Washington Post Health section. Cameron has agreed to e-mail the link to everyone in the class. Your other option is to bring a magazine or newspaper clipping that illustrates a methodological controversy, such as the Arbitron radio article from Oct. 10.
F 5/8/09	No class today. Group leaders, please e-mail your revised proposals (including methodology and timeline) to me over the weekend so that I can start reviewing them for suitability. Please remember to prefix your subject line with two underscore characters ( __ ) so that I know it is legitimate.
M 5/11/09	Review of the sudden-death (starred) questions from the Must-Pass Quiz.
T 5/12/09	Must-Pass Quiz: A short written portion will be used to weed out the poseurs from those who have studied. Those who survive the initial cut will be given an opportunity to finish up if they wish (orally, of course). Since everyone must pass before the end of the year, you might as well study so that you can get through in as few attempts as possible. Remember, each additional attempt becomes slightly harder because of the increased number of questions.
W 5/13/09	Must-Pass Quiz.
Th 5/14/09	Must-Pass Quiz (on a Friday schedule).
F 5/15/09	Must-Pass Quiz (on a Thursday schedule).
M 5/18/09	Must-Pass Quiz.
T 5/19/09	Final projects due at 4:00 p.m. Extension requests will be considered, but as always, not for more additional time than the length of time between the time of the request and 4:00 p.m. today, on the theory that you should have known earlier that you were behind schedule. For example, an extension request received at noon on Monday, 5/18, will result in a maximum extension of 28 additional hours, i.e., until 8:00 p.m. on Wednesday.
W 5/20/09	Field Trip to the National Cryptologic Museum, Fort Meade, MD. Bus leaves just after 8:00 a.m., so hurry back from McDonald’s! We will be back on campus by 1:00 p.m. You are expected to attend the second half of your F period class. Dress code is required for the field trip unless you have purchased a tag from Ms. Spaulding. Students not attending the field trip will need to write an essay (approx. 35-40 minutes) to be turned in on Thursday, May 21, on the following topic. The four themes of AP Statistics are exploratory data analysis, probability, experimental design, and inferential statistics. In your own words, not copied and pasted from the Internet, tie these four themes into a coherent whole. In other words, how do these topics fit together in your mind? You will need, at a minimum, to include such “glue” concepts as the definition of stemplot, histogram, and boxplot, the definition and implications of random variables and sampling distributions, and above all, the deep interrelationship between statistics, parameters, and random variables. Examples drawn from your own life are encouraged. Complete sentences and acceptable grammar are required. Some leniency for spelling will be granted.
Th 5/21/09	HW due: STAtistics essay (see yesterday’s calendar entry). Students who went on the field trip are exempt.
F 5/22/09	Last day of school. T-shirts will be available for $9.00.

Essential Links:
-- STA School Handbook
-- College Board: AP Statistics Course Description
-- Our textbook’s site has online quizzes and some useful lin
-- RVLS (Rice Virtual Lab in Statistics): One of the best sites anywhere for statistics! Here you’ll find a complete college statistics course (complete with clickable glossary and great case studies), simulations, and some excellent analysis tools.
-- Virtual Laboratories in Probability and Statistics (University of Alabama at Huntsville)
-- StatCrunch 3.0 (formerly WebStat): An on-line statistical computing package (requires Java)
-- How to study statistics (written by a professor at the University of Central Florida, but the ideas are valid for our class)
-- Eric Weisstein’s World of Mathematics: a monstrously huge hyperlinked reference

TI-83 Links:
-- CINT (converts confidence interval from interval notation to the more convenient “estimate ± m.o.e.” format)
-- INVT (inverse t) program written by Mr. Hansen and the Class of 1999
-- CHISQGOF (Chi-Square Goodness of Fit) program also written by Mr. Hansen and the Class of 1999
-- CSDELUXE (Chi-Square Deluxe): combines CHISQGOF and STAT TESTS C into one package; written by Mr. Hansen for the Class of 2003
-- Modifications to SCATRBOX program so that it returns the LSRL equation at the end (follow-on to a stat teacher workshop I attended on 12/5/2001)
-- David Pachner’s statistical test and confidence interval files for the TI-83 (added 4/16/2001; not reviewed by Mr. Hansen for accuracy)
-- TI-83 programs from Texas Instruments

Philosophical Links:
-- In praise of Bayes: a very readable overview of the tension between the standard (“frequentist”) approach to probability and the Bayesian view

Controversial Links:
-- Does an elite college really pay? Article addresses the issue of whether you would do better financially if you simply invested the difference in tuition price.

Fun Links:
-- Guessing correlation coefficients by eye
-- Another correlation game (takes longer to load, but allows you to achieve fame if you score in the top 20 worldwide)
-- Photos from our 5/20/99 field trip to the National Cryptologic Museum at the NSA
-- Huge Internet gallery of statistics jokes (warning: many are excellent, but some are dangerously lame)
-- Average age at death for rock stars is 36.9 (vs. 75.8 for the overall population). . . this site is religiously oriented (and apparently sincere), but the reasoning process is seriously flawed. Can you find the problem?
-- Chance Database Welcome Page (this is the link cited in the 4/4/99 Washington Post Unconventional Wiz column)
-- Accident statistics (the taxicab problem)
-- Psychological probability quiz
-- Marilyn is Wrong! (a truly great site, even though it doesn’t seem to include Dr. Morse’s response to Marilyn yet)
-- Male sweat may be good for women’s health (a scholarly article with p- and t-values from 2003, plus an abstract in 2007)
-- Lying with statistics
-- One of the biggest marketing blunders of all time: the New Coke fiasco
-- More fun links on Mr. Hansen’s home page

Serious Links (click here)

Extra Credit (please see me if interested):
-- American Statistical Association poster or project competition, deadline 4/1/2009
-- Washington Statistical Society Curtis Jacobs Memorial Prize, deadline 5/18/2009
-- Other extra credit options are available under the Fun Links at modd.net (see Mathcross Puzzles)

Group Projects (1998 onward):
Exploratory Data Analysis
-- Assignment (2005-06)
-- Results (1998-99)
-- Results (1999-2000)
-- Results (2000-01)
-- Results (2005-06)
Opinion Survey
-- Assignment (2000-01)
-- Results (1999-2000)
-- Results (2000-01)
Experimental Design and Execution
-- Assignment (2000-01)
-- Results (1998-99)
-- Results (2000-01)
Pairs Project on How to Lie With Statistics and P-value Calculations
-- Assignment (2000-01)
-- List of Partners (2000-01)
Critique of a Scientific Article
-- Assignment
AP Review
-- D period (1998-99)
-- F period (1998-99)

Test #1 (Chapters 1-2 plus §3.1 of new textbook), Sept. 2000:
-- Test #1

Old Test #1 (Introduction through Section 2.2 of old textbook):
-- Study guide
-- Test #1D--has a residual plot question not found in the F period version
-- Test #1F

Test #2, Oct. 1998:
-- Mr. Hansen’s study guide
-- Eric Love’s study guide (1/12/1999 revised version)
-- Test #2 (merged version, with comments)

Test #3 (Chapter 5) for 1999-2000
-- Answers to practice test (the practice test was handed out in hard copy form on 11/15/1999)
-- Take-home portion distributed 11/16/1999, due 11/17/1999

Old Test #3 (Chapter 4 of old textbook):
-- Study guide
-- Test #3 (merged version)
-- Answer key

Test #4 (Sections 5.1, 5.2, 6.1 of old textbook):
-- Study guide
-- Test #4D
-- Test #4F

Test #4 (Chapters 7 and 8 of new textbook: random variables, binomial & geometric distributions):
-- Actual test, 1/29/2004

Test #5 (Sections 6.2, 6.3, 7.1 of old textbook):
-- Study guide
-- Practice test
-- Answer key for practice test (incl. correction to #18 suggested by C. Muller)
-- Test #5 (merged version)

Test #5 (Sections 7.2 through 9.1 of new textbook):
-- Actual test, 2/6/2002

Test #6 (Sections 7.1-7.3 of old textbook):
-- Practice test
-- Answer key for practice test
-- Test #6D, with answer key

Test #6 (Chapters 9 and 10 of new textbook):
-- Actual test, 3/7/2002

Test #7 (Sections 8.1-8.3 of old textbook, plus Chi-Square GOF):
-- Answer key for sample test problems
-- In-class portion
-- Take-home portion

Test #8 (Section 9.1 of old textbook, plus Geometric Probability Distributions):
-- Take-home test due Wednesday 4/28/1999
-- Answer key (not yet released)

AP Exam Review
-- Real sample AP questions from the College Board
-- TI-83 Function Summary
-- TI-83 STAT TESTS Summary, including the assumptions you need to check
-- PHA(S)TPC procedures, a systematic way of performing statistical tests and calculating confidence intervals
-- LSRL Top Ten
-- Normal vs. Binomial: What are the hallmarks and differences? (Includes many example problems, with solutions.)
-- Formula sheet markup guide

Question of the day: 12/15/1998

Preview of quiz for Wednesday, 11/18/1998

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Last updated: 19 May 2009