LEARNING THE LANGUAGE OF STATISTICS: CHALLENGES AND TEACHING APPROACHES

Authors

  • PETER K. DUNN University of the Sunshine Coast
  • MICHAEL D. CAREY University of the Sunshine Coast
  • ALICE M. RICHARDSON University of Canberra
  • CHRISTINE MCDONALD University of Southern Queensland

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.52041/serj.v15i1.255

Keywords:

Statistics education research, Undergraduate students, Discipline language, Teaching practice

Abstract

Learning statistics requires learning the language of statistics. Statistics draws upon words from general English, mathematical English, discipline-specific English and words used primarily in statistics. This leads to many linguistic challenges in teaching statistics and the way in which the language is used in statistics creates an extra layer of challenge. This paper identifies several challenges in teaching statistics related to language. Some implications for the effective learning and teaching of statistics are raised and methods to help students overcome these linguistic challenges are suggested.

First published May 2016 at Statistics Education Research Journal Archives

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Published

2016-05-31

Issue

Vol. 15 No. 1 (2016)

Section

Regular Articles