Grant recipients: Diana Skrzydlo and Nam-Hwui Kim, Department of Statistics and Actuarial Science
(Project timeline: September 2015 - August 2016)
Description
To improve student motivation and learning in STAT 334, a statistics course for business students, we introduced several new techniques in the course. We had interactive tutorial activities to work on difficult threshold concepts, a case study competition to encourage students to choose meaningful topics through which to explore the course material, and individual oral exams to deepen their knowledge and communication skills. We collected student feedback through a pre- and post-course questionnaire, individual reflection assignments on the case study, and an anonymous post-course survey. The students appreciated engaging more actively with the material and found the course rewarding and beneficial.
Questions Investigated
Our goals for this project were:
- To promote deeper understanding of presented material and higher mathematical maturity (by having interactive weekly activities and providing continuous feedback, measured by pre and post-course questionnaire)
- Increased interest in statistics and stronger intrinsic motivation toward learning (by allowing students the freedom to choose their own topics to apply course concepts to)
Questions to be investigated were:
- Can discovery-based learning aid in enriched learning?
- Can a case study with freedom of topic choice increase students’ interest and motivation in learning?
Findings/Insights
The students’ understanding of the material improved over the term in various ways. We observed an improvement in the quality of questions asked during tutorials as the term went on; near the beginning, students would ask “how do you do this?” whereas closer to the end they would have tried some approaches on their own.
Looking at the pre-course and post-course questionnaires, the average correctness improved by 31% (2.45 points out of 8) and the average confidence in their answers improved from 2.5/5 to 4/5. Greater improvement over their pre-course score was associated with a higher grade in the course, with each point improvement meaning a 1.5% higher grade. (p-value 0.03)
According to the post-course survey, 98% of the students found the tutorials enriched their learning experience!
In terms of the case study, most students noted in their reflection papers that they found being more deeply involved with the material to be a valuable learning experience and helped solidify the course concepts. In the survey, 89% of students said they found the case study enriched their learning experience, and 76% said the freedom to choose their topic improved their motivation.
Dissemination and Impact
- At the individual level: On the students themselves in the two terms of STAT 334, they engaged more deeply with the material and had their eyes opened to the many ways the course material can apply to real life situations. I passed along all my material to the person teaching STAT 334 this coming year, and she continued the interactive tutorials and the case study. I also started a teaching blog on my personal faculty website.
- At the Department/School and/or Faculty/Unit levels: We held a SAS department seminar on June 16, 2016 where we shared the activities we used and the findings of this work, very similar to the presentation in part (c). We hope that this will become a regular series of faculty in our department sharing their teaching practices with each other, tentatively called the SAS Teaching Practices (STP) Seminar Series and supported by the SAS department chair, Stefan Steiner.
- At the institutional (uWaterloo) level: I presented a seminar at this year’s OND conference on April 28, 2016, where I talked about the activities and their impact on student learning outcomes. The talk was well received and I had many positive comments. The slides for this presentation (which is also the basis for the slides for the STEP seminar mentioned above) are on my teaching blog.
- At the provincial, national and/or international levels: I presented a talk at last year’s ARC (Actuarial Research Conference) on Aug 5-8, 2015 on the use of Oral Exams in statistics and actuarial science education. I have used oral exams in other courses as well, so that work was not exclusively related to this LITE grant, but I used some experience and examples from this course. I also attended this year’s ARC (Actuarial Research Conference) on July 27-30, 2016 and gave a talk about incorporating communication-based activities into statistical and actuarial courses. I drew on some of the work done for this course, as well as others.
Impact of the Project
- Teaching: I intend to continue as much as possible having case-based or exploratory projects in my courses, interactive tutorials, and oral exams where the class size permits. For example, I used oral exams last term in ACTSC 455, and I am including a project in STAT 443 this term (despite the class size being over 150!) because the value in allowing the students to choose their own topic and work with real data cannot be underestimated.
- Involvement in other activities or projects: Starting the new STP Seminar Series. I gave the first one and we have plans to have one or two faculty present some interesting teaching innovations each term.
References
Project Reference List (PDF)