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Busting Myths
Citation
Chick, HL, Busting Myths, Australian Mathematics Teacher, 69, (4) pp. 16-22. ISSN 0045-0685 (2014) [Professional, Non Refereed Article]
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Abstract
A recent episode of MythBusters (Williams, 2013) involved a series of "battles
of the sexes" to examine myths and urban legends about things that men
are supposedly better (or worse) at doing than women. Some of the processes
that were used on the show to investigate these myths, along with the data they
generated, can be used to examine some interesting statistical ideas, varying from
a quite simple examination of distributions to an elementary exploration of beginning
hypothesis testing. As such they would be suitable for secondary classrooms,
where the content aligns well with Australian Cuniculum: Mathematics.
In this article I will describe two of the segments and discuss some of the
issues that could be addressed in a classroom. Ideally it would be good to be able
to view the segments as part of any lesson (at the time of writing it was possible
to purchase the episode via an online media supplier; see note at end of article),
but it is hoped that there is enough information in what follows for teachers to be
able to provide an explanation of the segments and the data sets should still be
sufficient to stimulate good classroom discussion.
Item Details
Item Type: | Professional, Non Refereed Article |
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Keywords: | statistics education, average, distribution, inference |
Research Division: | Education |
Research Group: | Curriculum and pedagogy |
Research Field: | Mathematics and numeracy curriculum and pedagogy |
Objective Division: | Education and Training |
Objective Group: | Teaching and curriculum |
Objective Field: | Teacher and instructor development |
UTAS Author: | Chick, HL (Associate Professor Helen Chick) |
ID Code: | 93068 |
Year Published: | 2014 (online first 2013) |
Deposited By: | Education |
Deposited On: | 2014-07-09 |
Last Modified: | 2014-07-21 |
Downloads: | 0 |
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