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Elementary Preservice Teachers Engaging in a Task for Statistical Problem - Solving

Zareen Aga & Ann Wallace

Statistical data analysis and sense - making are es sential skills in today ’ s world. Necessary actions must be taken to ensure all students get opportuni ties to develop statistical literacy. As stressed in the recent Pre - K– 12 Guidelines for Assessment and Instruction in Statistics Education II: A Frame work for Statistics and Data Science Education (GAISE II, 2020), an emphasis on data analysis and statistical literacy must begin in the early grades. The GAISE II report echoes the recom mendations of the Catalyzing Change series (NCTM, 2018; 2020a; 2020b) for actionable steps to rethink K - 12 statistics education. The report pro vides a framework for statistical education that in cludes the statistical problem - solving process with its 4 steps, “( i) Formulate Statistical Investigative Questions, (ii) Collect/Consider the Data, (iii) Ana lyze the Data, and (iv) Interpret the Re sults ” (GAISE II, p. 13). The framework also in volves three developmental levels of statistical lit eracy. These levels range from building on stu dents' intuitive knowledge of statistics to providing tools for statistical analysis, and finally applying these tools in the real world. These levels can be grade or age - specific and allow for students ’ prior experience with statistics to determine their level of statistical literacy (GAISE II, 2020). Being mindful of these levels in conjunction with the statistical problem - solving process may prove essential in bringing forth the recommended chang es in K - 12 education. However, it is not advisable

that students wait until high school to learn about statistical data analysis. According to a message from NCTM ’ s former president, Dr. Berry, “ Statistical literacy develops over time and begins in early childhood and ele mentary school and continues throughout middle and high school and beyond ” (President ’ s message, 2020). Likewise, NCTM ’ s Catalyzing Change se ries stresses the need to engage students in statisti cal reasoning from early childhood, “ Children should have opportunities to examine and make sense of data and use data to answer questions about specific situations in their everyday lives ” (NCTM 2020a, p.109). Given the need for statistical education in early grades, it is essential for elementary teachers to develop the necessary skills to support their stu dents (Martinez & LaLonde, 2020; Litke, & Hill, 2020). This requires elementary pre - service teach ers (PST) to have experiences with doing and teaching statistical data analysis in their education programs (President ’ s message, 2020). To fill this need we developed an activity for ele mentary PSTs to engage in statistical data analysis and reasoning. The activity was designed as part of an action research project to improve statistics edu cation for elementary PSTs. Our goal for this activ ity was to have our PSTs experience statistical data analysis and for us to identify areas of improve ment in the activity to improve their learning expe-

Virginia Mathematics Teacher vol. 48, no. 1

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