Playing Games with a Purpose: A New Approach to Teaching and Learning Statistics

该项目的研究人员正在开发、实施和评估交互式网络游戏和相应的研究性实验室模块（实验室），以有效地向本科生教授统计思维和科学探究过程。每个基于游戏的实验室都会在案例研究的背景下提出一个研究问题，并鼓励学生遵循完整的统计分析过程。这些材料包括为大学入门课程设计的一到两天的活动，以及面向高级本科课程的更复杂的项目。以游戏为基础的实验室为学生提供了早期机会，让他们体验研究科学家的角色，并了解统计领域如何帮助推进科学知识。该项目的智力价值在于，通过将基于游戏的尖端技术与现实研究问题相结合，在学生学术生涯的多个阶段培养统计思维，对统计教育的学术贡献。该方法采纳了美国数学协会（Mathematical Association of America）和美国统计协会（American Statistical Association）的建议，鼓励学生收集数据，确定适当的分析技术，使用技术，进行分析，做出推断，解释，然后呈现结果。该项目的更广泛影响体现在它创造了一种新的教育模式，这种模式具有影响统计教育方向的巨大潜力。特别是基于游戏的实验室能够让学生探索个性化的研究问题和及时的反馈，这些反馈与他们的游戏目标直接相关。为学生提供有趣的现实问题，展示统计学作为一门学科的知识内容和广泛的适用性，鼓励学生考虑统计学的职业生涯或将统计思维纳入任何职业。

The investigators on this project are developing, implementing, and evaluating interactive Web-based games and corresponding investigative laboratory modules (labs) to effectively teach statistical thinking and the process of scientific inquiry to undergraduate students. Each game-based lab presents a research question in the context of a case study and encourages students to follow a complete process of statistical analysis. These materials consist of one- or two-day activities designed for introductory college courses as well as more complex projects geared toward upper level undergraduate courses. The game-based labs provide early opportunities for students to experience the role of a research scientist and to understand how the field of statistics helps advance scientific knowledge. The intellectual merit of this project lies in its contribution to the scholarship of statistics education by combining cutting-edge game-based technology with realistic research problems to foster statistical thinking at multiple stages of a student's academic career. The approach embraces recommendations from the Mathematical Association of America and the American Statistical Association that encourage students to collect data, determine an appropriate technique for analysis, use technology, perform the analysis, make inferences, interpret and then present the results. The broader impacts of the project are felt through its creation of a new educational model that holds strong potential to influence the direction of statistics education. In particular the game-based labs enable the exploration of individualized research questions and just-in-time feedback that students recognize as directly related to the goals within their game. Providing students with intriguing real-world problems that demonstrate the intellectual content and broad applicability of statistics as a discipline encourages students to consider a career in statistics or to incorporate statistical thinking into any career.