Subject: [MATHEDCC] Percent questions in Statistics
From: Colleen Ryan (cryan77@yahoo.com)
Date: Sat Jan 29 2000 - 14:08:17 EST
I have noticed that my statistics students have a very hard time with
percent questions. Even the students who have done well in the
prerequisite course, Intermediate Algebra, have trouble with them.
I would love to find out if this is unique to my school (Oxnard College in
southern California) or whether it is widespread.
Below is a question they have a lot of trouble with.
Question:
Here is some data in the form of a two way table which classifies each
student as to gender and also whether they brought a calculator to the
first day of class.
Men Women
Yes Calculator 4 24
No Calculator 13 20
(To Teacher: After a brief explanation of how two-way tables work and how
the marginal totals and grand total are obtained, please ask the following
question.)
What percent of the people who brought a calculator are men?
If anyone teaching Elementary Statistics with an Intermediate Algebra
prerequisite does this, please let me know what percentage of your class
answered correctly.
If you teach Intermediate Algebra, I would also be interested in the
percent who get it correct.
Also could you let me know what part of the country you are from and what
type of school. I thank you in advance. If I get a widespread response, I
will let you know the results.
Colleen Ryan
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