MATH 171 STATISTICAL DECISION MAKING

Transcription

1 MATH 171 STATISTICAL DECISION MAKING Instructor: William Abrams , Ruffner 327) Office Hours:MWF 10:20-11:30, M 3:30-4, T 11-11:30, R 2-3 or by appointment. Course Description: An elementary statistics course designed to give students a working knowledge of the ideas and tools of practical statistics and their usefulness in problem solving and decision making. Topics include graphical displays of data, measures of central tendency and variability, elementary probability concepts, the normal distribution, correlation and regression, and confidence intervals and hypothesis testing for means and proportions. Special emphasis is placed upon the proper use and interpretation of statistics in real life situations. 3 credits. * Fulfills General Education Goal 5 Text: Moore, David The Basic Practice of Statistics, 5th ed., Freeman 2010.You will also need access to StatsPortal. Since StatsPortal comes with the ebook, you do not need to buy a hardcopy. As for a calculator, I suggest a TI-83 or 84, but if you already have a different one come talk to me before buying a new calculator. You might not need to. Course Requirements 1: There will be quizzes, labs, group work, homework, at least one written project, three tests, and a final exam. The tests together are worth 30%, the final is worth 20%, the projects together are worth 10%, the homework is worth 15%, 10% for quizzes, 5% for labs, and 10% for group work. You are also required to regularly read the book and to check your Longwood , StatsPortal, and Canvas daily. Also it is your responsibility to keep up with the StatsPortal assignments. Any loss of grade due to your failure to read the book, check StatsPortal, your Longwood , or Canvas is not the fault of, or a problem for, the instructor. In particular online quizzes will often require that you read a section in the book, do some homework problems, and watch a video before you take them. 1

2 2 MATH 171 STATISTICAL DECISION MAKING Tentative Schedule: Week Dates Tentative Topics Week 1 Aug Ch. 1 Picturing Distributions Sept. 2 Labor Day Week 2 Sept. 3-6 Ch. 2 - Describing Distributions, Ch. 3 - Normal Distributions Week 3 Sept Ch. 3 Week 4 Sept Ch. 4 Scatterplots and Correlation Week 5 Sept Ch. 5. Regression TEST 1 Week 6 Sept Oct. 4 Ch. 6 Two Way Tables Week 7 Oct Empirical Probablility Oct Fall Break Week 8 Oct Ch. 8 Sampling, Ch. 9 Experiments Week 9 Oct Ch. 11 Sampling Distributions Week 10 Oct Nov. 1 Ch. 14 Inference, TEST 2 Week 11 Nov. 4-8 Ch. 15, 17 Inference about a Population Mean Week 12 Nov Ch. 17, 18 More Inference about a Population Mean Week 13 Nov Ch. 18, 19 Inference for a Population Proportion Nov Thanksgiving Week 14 Nov. 2-6 Test III, Ch. 23 Inference for Regression Grading: Suppose your numerical grade is x. If 92 x < 100 then you get an A. If 90 x < 92 then you get an A-. If 88 x < 90 then you get a B+. If 82 x < 88 then you get a B. If 80 x < 82 then you get a B-. If 78 x < 80 then you get a C+. If 72 x < 78 then you get a C. If 70 x < 72 then you get a C-. If 68 x < 70 then you get a D+. If 62 x < 68, then you get a D. If 60 x < 62 then you get a D-. If x < 60 then you get an F. Please remember that pluses and minuses now count towards your GPA. Labs: Labs must be worked in groups of three or four students. In each group there must be a group leader and a recorder. The group leader is just that, the person who is in charge of the discussion. The group recorder is responsible for keeping a clean copy of the consensus answers to each question, to be turned in. The answers that you all turn in should be the consensus of the group. These labs are meant to help you learn the material and everyone should keep a copy of the answers. These answers are also meant to be your notes for the day - I suggest you keep them as they will be useful in studying. (The recorder will get his or her copy back in time.) In a lab you may collaborate with the members of your group and the instructor. You may use your calculator, text, and notes unless you are told otherwise. You are also allowed to use anything that we say in class discussion. The grade will be based on a realistic assessment by the instructor of what sort

3 MATH 171 STATISTICAL DECISION MAKING 3 of answers you should get. Sometimes there will be Lab questions you are not expected to get right, in which case you can only lose all the credit if you leave it blank. Sometimes there will be Lab questions that you are not expected to get to, in which case getting to these questions can make up for not getting an earlier question correct. Group Work: Group work may be done in groups of up to four students. While this work is also meant to help you learn, it is expected that you will be able to answer correctly all the questions given in group work. These assignments will be graded based on accuracy. You may use your calculator, textbook, notes, the other members of your group, and the instructor. Tests: The tests will assume that you have come to class, done everything asked of you in class, taken all the quizzes, and done all the homework. They will also assume that you understand all that stuff. If you do not understand all that stuff, I strongly suggest you do something about it. Assuming that everything will get better its own never works. Quizzes: These will be brief and will be given irregularly at the beginning of class or online. These quizzes are open book, notes, and calculator, but you cannot confer with anyone else. I do not have to have taught the material in order to give you a quiz, if I ask you to read the material before class then the quiz can be based on the reading. Note that online quizzes might be timed and have suggestions as to what you should read before you take them. While I will try to you if there is an online quiz, please get in the habit of checking Canvas and StatsPortal regularly the day before class just in case. Homework: The homework will be generally assigned through StatsPortal. The homework is to be your own work, although you can use your text, notes, and calculator. Also remember you can always ask questions of the instructor. Projects: Projects will be done individually. They will involve mathematics, but you will also be graded on how you present the mathematics, in particular these projects will require a substantial amount of writing. Grammar and syntax will be part of the grade. I will give you more details when I assign the projects. Basic Skills Quiz: The Basic Skills Quiz will be given the first week of class. No matter what you actually get on this quiz, it will count as a perfect quiz score towards your quiz average. If you get less than a 50%, however, you will be required to complete an additional assignment before the withdrawal date which is October 16th In the past this assignment

4 4 MATH 171 STATISTICAL DECISION MAKING has required each student to complete six hours of tutoring in Math 171. I expect it will be the same this year, but I reserve the right to change it. If you get less than a 50% on the Basic Skills Quiz, I will notify you and tell you what you have to do. Attendance: Is expected at all classes. Students who do not attend class fail. If something happens and you feel that you must miss class, please let me know in advance. Honor Code: All of your turn in work is covered by the Longwood University Honor Code. If you are caught using resources that you are not allowed to use, you will get a zero on the assignment and your name will be turned over to the Longwood University Honor Board. If you are uncertain what you are allowed to use on an assignment, consult with the instructor immediately. Course Requirements 2: No one knows for sure what it will take for you to be successful in this course. Some of you will have already seen some of this material. Others will not have seen the material but will have an excellent mathematics background which will allow you to work through the appropriate problems and get it quickly. Most of you will not have a background that is good enough to learn this material quickly. It will require a lot of work. The responsibility for learning this material is yours. Of course, I have certain responsibilities as well. Here they are: (1) I will tell you what material you need to learn and try to connect it with material you have already learned. (2) I will give you examples to work on so that you can tell if you have learned the material. (3) I will go over some of those examples so that you can identify the mistakes you are making. (4) When possible I will try to explain to you why this material is interesting and what it is used for. (5) I will be available, during office hours, to help you see why those are mistakes and help you understand why you are making them. (6) I will do my best to help you though , although is a much more difficult way to learn math. (7) I will make the tests and quizzes dependent on material that I have told you that you need to know. So there you have it. I am going to tell you what you need to learn and then you just have to learn it. Learn it, not just memorize it. There is a difference. If you have truly learned the material then you should be able to answer any question I give you that requires only that material and the

5 MATH 171 STATISTICAL DECISION MAKING 5 mathematics we assume you know from previous classes. (If you want to know what math that is, you are welcome to look up the VA. SOLS for math classes through Algebra II. Fortunately you do not have to know all of that for this class.) Some of the problems on the tests will look similar to those we have done. Some of them will look very different. Some of you will run into trouble. Here are some suggestions that I have found help people. (1) Show up. If you do not come to class, you are not interested in getting a decent grade. And do not just show up, but show up ready, with the appropriate materials. Then pay attention. Unless you have the cell phone implanted in your brain, everyone can tell you are texting or playing on the internet. (2) If I am lecturing or working an example, take notes. Writing the material down in your own style will be the first step in learning it. (3) Read the notes within a couple of days of writing them. Writing good notes is something you have to learn to do. If your notes do not make sense, add comments to them so that they do. If you cannot figure out what was going on in your notes, ask me! (4) Read the book. This gives you a different presentation of the material. And sometimes it gives you different examples. (5) Form a study group. Most people learn better working with others. Be careful about the honor code. I have tried to outline carefully what the code requires for specific assignments. If you are not sure, ask me. (6) ASK QUESTIONS! This is the most important thing to do. The longer you wait to ask a question, the worse you will do. If you have a disability and require accommodations, please meet with me early in the semester to discuss your learning needs. If you wish to request reasonable accommodations (note taking support, extended time for tests, etc.), you will need to register with the Office of Disability Resources (Graham Hall, ). The office will require appropriate documentation of disability. All information is kept confidential.