Relfection

I have learned, as a result from this project, that statistical math is

used a lot in the real world more than any other math class I have been in. It

was great to learn in class how statistics is used in real life scenarios to help

better understand data. In the semester we were given a group project to

apply the concepts we learned in class (data collection, sorting and analyzing

data, cofidence intervals, creating different types of charts, hypothesis test,

and forming conclusions) with a hands on learning project with skittles! Who

doesnt love skittles? We collected a sample of our class to each buy an

individual bag of skittles and then sort by color and compare the information.

Like a light bulb went off in my head, I finally understood the concepts

of each concept we had gone over. I learn so much more when I am

presented with hands on learning opportunities, and Im sure there are

others that are the same. Also, working with my fellow classmates help

create a helpful learning environment when we all learned together as peers

outside the classroom. Something about working with a study partner or a

study group always helps me understand so much more than working by

myself especially in difficult subjects like statistics. As a group, we supported

and helped each other through each of our strengths and weaknesses for

each chapter throughout the semester.

During this skittles project I think it helped when we immediately

identified with our best strengths and divided the work. I was better at

writing so I did many of the reflection paragraphs and definitions. Kari,

helped with a lot of the computer work. Jamie had strengths in charting and

graphs on Microsoft Excel. Tatiana did the hypothesis testing and confidene

intervals. Chuck and John helped with the conclusion. We all met up several

times to piece together the problems and problem solve a few hiccups with

the data. For example, we had a few problems with creating the boxplot and

paredo chart on the computer. Instead of struggling on our own we reached

out to one another to just scan our work onto a document.

This class is the first college course I was allowed to use a very helpful

tool, a graphing calculator! Becoming familiar with the ins and outs of the

graphing calculator capabilities will be so extremely helpful for future classes

like General Chemistry in the Summer and Bio-Organic Chemistry in the

Spring. Really this class should be changed from Intro to Statistics to Into

to How to Use Your $100 Calculator! Also learning how to specfically use

graphs and the correct charts according the data could be helpful in a lot of

areas of study. It helps as a student looking into a professional career to have

the knowledge and skills of simple statistical data.

This project helped me look at data differently, because now having to

know statistical data its hard to unsee it that way. For example, every time I

look at how data is collected like through drug trials I wonder how biased the

information is. Or if sometimes telephone research surverys call asking for a

survey and you are compensated with a twenty-dollar check I now know that

it can trigger a bias in the response. It definitely changed the way I now think

of real life scenarios.