Current Issue

(Spring 2010) - This issue may be read for free throughout 2010 on the Wiley InterScience site.

What is Benford’s Law? P2. Jonathan R. Bradley and David L. Farnsworth
This surprising property of many data sets that their first significant digits follow Benford’s Law provides examples that can pique and hold students’ interest. Several ideas for student activities are presented.

Creating Realistic Data Sets with Specified Properties via Simulation P7. Robert N. Goldman and John D. McKenzie Jr.
We explain how to simulaste both univariate and bivariate raw data sets having specified values for common summary statistics. The first example illustrates how to ‘construct’ a data set having prescribed values for the mean and the standard deviation – for a one-sample t test with a specified outcome. The second shows how to create a bivariate data set with a specified correlation coefficient.

The Obsolescence of Copmutational Formulae P12. Daved M. Muttart
Computational formulae are a throwback to a time when computers were not widely available. Today their teaching obscures important underpinnings of statistical theory and practise.

A Straight Look at Skew Distributions P15. Michael Bedwell
This article argues that the Normal distribution is often not a good model for anthropomorphic data.

An Array of Online Teaching Tools P17. Stephen Bush, Gordon Menzies and Susan Thorp
The Internet offers a huge array of teaching resources for statistics. Here we present a selection of engaging Web-based tools, ranging from class surveys to individual simulation experiments.

Internet Approach versus Lecture and Lab Based Approach for Teaching an Introductory Statistical Methods Course: Students’ Opinions P21. H. Dean Johnson, Nairanjana Dasgupta, Hao Zhang and Marc A. Evans
The use of the Internet as a teaching tool continues to grow in popularity at colleges and universities. We consider, from the students’ perspective, the use of an Internet approach compared to a lecture and lab-based approach for teaching an introductory course in statistical methods. We conducted a survey of introductory statistics students. Contradictory to what was hypothesized by the authors they favoured keeping the lecture and lab-based approach for teaching the class.

Statistical Diversions P27. Peter Petocz and Eric Sowey
The usual Statistical column to get you thinking.

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