Introduction to Statistics for Beginners

Dr. Michelle Everson

Aim of Course:

To provide an easy introduction to statistics for those with little or no prior exposure to basic probability and descriptive statistics in preparation for the two course sequence Introduction to Statistics 1:  Inference for a Single Variable and Introduction to Statistics 2: Working with Bivariate Data.

Who Should Take This Course:

Anyone with no prior statistical background who wishes to take Introduction to Statistics I:  Inference for a Single Variable. 

Course Program:

The course is structured as follows:

The Instructor:

Dr. Michelle Everson teaches and develops online courses in the Educational Psychology Dept. at the University of Minnesota. She has written in Teaching Statistics on the implementation of educational reform in the standard college introductory statistics course; her research is in the area of text comprehension.

Organization of the Course:

The course takes place over the internet, at statistics.com. During each course week, you participate at times of your own choosing - there are no set times when you must be online. Course participants will be given access to a private discussion board. In class discussions led by the instructor, you can post questions, seek clarification, and interact with your fellow students and the instructor. The course is scheduled to take place over 3 weeks, and typically requires 15 hours per week. At the beginning of each week, you receive the relevant material, in addition to answers to exercises from the previous session. During the week, you are expected to go over the course materials and work through exercises. Discussion among participants is encouraged. The instructor will provide answers and comments.

Credit:

This course offers continuing education units (CEU's). For those successfully completing the course (generally this means marks of 50% or better on the homework), 3.75 CEU's and a certificate will be issued by statistics.com, upon request.

Dates:

Sep. 3 - Sep. 24, 2010 FULL!
Nov. 5 - Nov. 26, 2010
Click here to be notified of future course offerings.

Participants gain access to the online materials on the first day of the course, and typically spend about 15 hours per week (at their convenience). You retain full access to course materials, including discussion board, for two weeks after the course closing date.

Level:

Beginner

Prerequisite:

No prior study of statistics is required. The only mathematics you need is arithmetic.

Course Text:

There is not a required text for this course. All the course materials will be provided during the course. If however, you do wish to have a text for reference, we suggest Stats: Data and Models, by De Veaux, Velleman and Bock, with ActivStats CD since the software will be useful for the course. This is also the text that is used for Introduction to Statistics 1 and 2, if you decide to continue your studies. To ensure that you receive a valid copy of ActivStats, you should purchase the textbook directly from the publisher here. Addison Wesley/Pearson offers a 15% discount on this book (and all other statistics titles): enter the code STATSMPS in the Promotion Code field when prompted during checkout and click the Apply Discount button. Questions about US orders (sometimes the web erroneously shows the book out of stock) use this phone number (800-947-7700, then 5 then 1) to contact Pearson.

Special note for Canadian customers: If you are located in Canada, place your order on myPearsonStore.ca site. Unfortunately, the publisher does not currently extend this discount to Canada (you might try requesting this from the publisher's Canadian office directly). The offer for free shipping applies only to orders shipping within the US. The US website will not let you choose "Canada" as a ship-to country.

Software:

This course will require software to do simple resampling/simulation operations. Several such programs are available:

1. Box Sampler, which can be downloaded here. This is a free add-in for Excel, designed as a visual teaching and learning tool for doing resampling simulations. Runs only on Windows.
2. Resampling Stats for Excel, which can be downloaded here. This is a commercial add-in for Excel, designed as a practitioner's tool for doing resampling simulations. A free license is available to all course participants, while they are enrolled in the statistics.com sequence of introductory statistics courses. Runs only on Windows.
3. StatCrunch, which is available here. This is a very affordable web-based statistical software program, which also has simulation and resampling capabilities. Runs over the web, so can be used with both Windows and Mac.

The course will feature Box Sampler, but the others are available as alternatives and some help is available for them.

Registration:

Register Online - $399
Register Online (academic) - $299 (you must be affiliated with a college, university or high school)

Add $50 service fee if you require a prior invoice, or if you need to submit a purchase order or voucher, pay by wire transfer or EFT, or refund and reprocess a prior payment. Please use this printed registration form, for these and other special orders.

Note: See our Introduction to Statistics course packages to save money on Introduction to Statistics for Beginners, Introduction to Statistics 1, Introduction to Statistics 2 and Introduction to Statistics 3.

Note: Courses may fill up at any time and registrations are processed in the order in which they are received.

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