New Zealand Statistical Association Newsletter 64
September 2006
School Statistics Curriculum
Education News
Joint ICMI /IASE Study - Call for
papers 
Stats Education DVD
From “Mathematics” to “Mathematics and Statistics”
A new draft curriculum has been released by the Minister of Education, Steve Maharey. Statistics has seen its profile dramatically increase, as the learning area previously entitled Mathematics is to be renamed Mathematics and Statistics. This reflects the differences between stochastic, statistical, data-driven thinking on the one hand, and deterministic, analytical mathematical thinking on the other. These two are not, of course, entirely different entities.
Members of our Education Committee have been actively involved in the process of producing this draft. Maxine Pfannkuch has been actively involved on the mathematics curriculum reference group to represent the statistical aspects and is continuing to write and refine aspects of the draft achievement objectives.
Now it’s your turn! You can read the draft curriculum online, and you can make submissions on it. To do this, there are two main URLs that will help:
http://www.tki.org.nz/r/nzcurriculum/pdfs/curriculum-framework-draft.pdf
http://www.tki.org.nz/r/nzcurriculum/index_e.php
The first of these gives you the main curriculum document. You may wish to read all of this, but if your time is limited I suggest that you go to page 19 which tries to encapsulate in a few words the essence of mathematics and statistics. You may also wish to consider the interaction between statistics and the other learning areas, particularly science, social science, technology, and health and physical education. Statistics needs to be integrated across the whole curriculum, and not just reside in mathematics.
An alternative is to ask for a hard copy. This is elegantly produced, with colour-coding (the Maths and Stats is in Burgundy) and fold-out pages. Contact Learning Media on 04 472 5522 or orders@learningmedia.co.nz .
If you wish to see the details of what is actually to be taught in mathematics and statistics all n one place, then you need to go to the second of these websites. Once you are in this, click on Achievement Objectives in the first blue box, then click on Mathematics and statistics curriculum achievement objectives. You can then peruse the objective for students. Roughly speaking Level 1 to 3 is what is done the primary school, Level 4 is typically covered in intermediate school, Levels 5 and 6 are done in the first 3 years of secondary school, with level 7 being Year 12 (sixth form) and Level 8 being covered in the final year of schooling.
Having read this material you may well have strong views you wish to express. We certainly hope you do. To make a submission, go to the second blue box under the second of these URLs. Or alternatively you may wish to contact Maxine (maxine.pfannkuch@auckland.ac.nz) or myself (alex.neill@nzcer.org.nz).
The authors of the Draft have been very careful to make sure that it is about the whole learning process, and not just about the seven subject-groups. There is plenty about this whole process on pages 3 – 12 and 24-34. There is much in the sections on Vision, Principles, Values and Key Competencies that involve Statistics. The section on Effective Pedagogy is very much in line with our views on the teaching and learning of Statistics.
The Statistics-specific parts of the document are have had varied amounts of input from ourselves. Here they are.
1. The subject name: Mathematics and Statistics
This suggests that NZ’s mathematics educators have made a major
paradigm shift in thinking about the role of mathematics (the third of
the 3 R’s). There is now the task of enabling the whole education
community to make this shift.
2. The one-sentence statement (p 13)
See the burgundy box.
3. The one-page introduction statement (p 19)
The Education Committee (together with our Auckland-based colleagues)
suggested substantial changes to the wording about statistics, and these
changes are incorporated in this draft. We hope you like it!
4. The Achievement Objectives for the eight Levels
The Statistics ‘strand’ consists of three ‘substrands’
or ‘threads’. The Education Committee (and Auckland colleagues)
have had varied amounts of input into these three so far.
• Statistical Investigation (thinking)
We’ve put lots of work into this, and the results are in this Draft.
Comments welcome.
• Statistical literacy
The words in the Draft are a very early version. We are working on a submission
that will replace them, and align them with the rest of the subject.
• Probability.
The words in the Draft are a very early version. We’ve put lots
of work into a new version, and will submit this to the Ministry. We’ll
send a copy to members on request.
There are two major issues about Statistics in the Curriculum:
- getting the words and concepts right in this document;
- resourcing and supporting schools so that they can action these concepts.
You may like to comment on those two issues.
The Ministry seeks responses by 30 November.
Alex Neill
Convenor
NZSA Education Committee
alex.neill@nzcer.org.nz
Statistics Education News
International News
ICOTS7, Working Cooperatively in Statistics Education, Salvador (Bahia), Brazil, July 2-7, 2006. The International Association for Statistical Education (IASE) and the International Statistical Institute (ISI) successfully organized the Seventh International Conference on Teaching Statistics (ICOTS-7), which was be hosted by the Brazilian Statistical Association (ABE) in Salvador (Bahia), Brazil, July 2-7, 2006. Despite problems with the Brazilian airline Varig many New Zealanders attended and presented at this conference. John Harraway and John Shanks, Otago University, were on the International Program Committee and were congratulated on their exceptional contribution to the conference. New Zealand featured prominently in the plenary speeches with Chris Wild presenting an outstanding talk on how to grow statistics student numbers in Universities, Brian Manly giving case studies of environmental statistics in New Zealand, and Len Cook giving a humorous talk at the conference dinner. Other New Zealanders present were: Matt Regan, Mike Forster, Joss Cumming, Christine Miller, Maxine Pfannkuch, Murray Black, Tim Burgess, Sashi Sharma, Lynda Merriman, Rachel Cunliffe, Doug Stirling, Jennifer Brown.
Joint ICMI/IASE Study, Statistics Education in School Mathematics: Challenges for teaching and Teacher Education. The International Commission on Mathematics Instruction (ICMI) Executive committee invited IASE to cooperate in a joint study focused on statistics. The invitation was accepted by IASE, which proposed to merge the Study Conference with IASE’s next Roundtable Conference to be held in 2008 in Monterey, Mexico. Carmen Batenero is chair of the International Programme Committee (IPC) of the joint study. Planning is underway for this study, which will result in a book being published in 2010. Meetings of the IPC were held at ICOTS-7 and further meetings are planned for ISI-56. For more information see: http://www.ugr.es/~icmi/iase_study/
SRTL-5 Forum. The 5th International Forum on Statistical Reasoning, Thinking and Literacy will be held in England at the University of Warwick, 11-17 August 2007. The focus of the Forum will be on Reasoning about Statistical Inference. For more information see: http://srtl.stat.auckland.ac.nz/
Maxine Pfannkuch
Joint ICMI /IASE Study
Statistics Education in School Mathematics: Challenges for Teaching and Teacher Education
The International Commission on Mathematical Instruction (ICMI, ) and the International Association for Statistical Education (IASE, http://www.stat.auckland.ac.nz/~iase/) are pleased to announce the Joint ICMI /IASE Study Statistics Education in School Mathematics: Challenges for Teaching and Teacher Education.
Following the tradition of ICMI Studies, this Study will comprise two parts: the Joint Study Conference and the production of the Joint Study book. The Joint Study Conference will be merged with the IASE 2008 Round Table Conference.
The Joint Study Conference (ICMI Study and IASE Round Table Conference) will take place at the Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores. Monterrey, Mexico (http://www.mty.itesm.mx/), from June 30 to July 4, 2008. Participation in the Conference is only by invitation, based on a submitted contribution and a refereeing process. Accepted papers will be presented in the Conference and will appear in the Proceedings that will be published by ICMI and IASE as a CD-ROM and on the Internet.
The second part of the Joint Study – the Joint Study book – will be produced after the conference and will be published in the ICMI Study Series. Participation in the Joint Study Conference does not automatically assure participation in the book, since a second selection and rewriting of selected papers will be made after the conference.
Proposed papers for contributions to the Joint Study Conference should be submitted by e-mail no later than October 1, 2007, to the IPC Study Chair (Carmen Batanero, batanero@ugr.es). Papers should be relevant to the Joint Study focus and research questions, as described in the Discussion Document (which is available at the Joint Study Website (http://www.ugr.es/~icmi/iase_study/). Guidelines for preparing and submitting the paper are also available in the Discussion Document. Please address questions to Carmen Batanero.
International Programme Committee
Carmen Batanero (Spain, Chair), Bernard Hodgson (Canada, representing
ICMI), Allan Rossman (USA, representing IASE), Armando Albert (México),
Dani Ben-Zvi (Israel), Gail Burrill (USA), Doreen Connor (UK), Joachim
Engel (Germany), Joan Garfield (USA), Jun Li (China), Maria Gabriella
Ottaviani (Italy), Lionel Pereira Mendoza (Singapore), Maxine Pfannkuch
(New Zealand), Mokaeane Victor Polaki (Lesotho), and Chris Reading (Australia).
Local Organising Committee
Blanca Ruiz (Chair), Armando Albert, Tomás Sánchez, Ernesto
Sánchez
Statistics Education DVD
A special session on statistics education was organised at the Dunedin NZSA Conference last year. Seven researchers at the University of Otago spoke about their research and illustrated the statistical procedures used in their work. This was filmed during the conference with the aim of making a DVD, and subsequently re-recorded in a studio environment. The second takes should be completed by about the end of March, with only two remaining to be filmed at the moment.
Since then Statistics New Zealand has also recorded two clips, which means nine case studies will be included in the final DVD.
The DVD of the talks is being produced by the Staff in the Higher Education Development Unit at the University of Otago. It will be available for use in all high schools in New Zealand, to assist in motivating the teaching of statistics. The corresponding data sets will also be available on an accompanying CD. John Harraway is already using this resource in his STAT110 lectures!
This project is supported by a grant of $750 from the Campbell Fund, and is being coordinated by John Harraway.
John Harraway