ASA/NCTM Joint Committee Members Share Favorite Resources
Amy Hogan, Susan A. Peters, and Hollylynne Lee
Against All Odds: Inside Statistics
Against All Odds is a 32-module set of short videos from Annenberg Learner that introduce statistics. They are meant to show statistics in various applications and in a relevant context. The website has links for a glossary, student guides, teacher guides, and interactive tools. Narrator Pardis Sabeti highlights the important concepts in each module, gives explanations for each, and sometimes explains how she uses statistics in her own work as a computational geneticist.
These videos could be used in the classroom as a topic summary, homework warmup, test review, or supplemental resource for students. Examples include the following:
- The Question of Causation – how scientists concluded smoking causes lung cancer
- Random Variables – computing the probability of the O-ring failure that led to the space shuttle Challenger explosion
- Inference for Two-Way Tables – investigating the relationship between genetic resistance to the deadly Lassa fever in West Africa
Census at School
Census at School, supported by the American Statistical Association, allows teachers to collect data from their students that the class can then analyze. Teachers can also download data collected from students from the same or different grade levels and from the same or different states—or even countries—to make comparisons.
The data includes information such as students’ heights, arm spans, reaction times in relation to a change in background color, favorite foods, and time spent on various activities.
The site makes it easy for teachers to engage students in the investigative process beyond data analysis. Students can consider the statistical questions they can ask and answer from the data collected. They can discuss how they might collect data that will allow them to answer the questions. They can consider issues such as sample and population for the students who responded to the questionnaire.
Data is downloaded from the site as .csv files, which can be imported into tools for analyzing it such as Common Online Data Analysis Platform. The data set includes information for numerous quantitative and categorical variables, which allows the data to be analyzed by students from many classes.
Finally, there are numerous resources that help teachers come up with ideas for using the site, including videos about exploring Census at School data using the Common Online Data Analysis Platform and lesson plans for K–5, 6–8, and 9–12 grade bands.
InSTEP
InSTEP is an online platform designed to support teachers and instructional coaches in grades 6–12+ who are learning to teach statistics and data science concepts and skills across the curriculum. The content is most applicable to those who teach courses in mathematics, statistics, data science, social studies, and science.
InSTEP contains short (1.5–2.5 hour) learning experiences organized in the following two ways:
- Data investigations
- Self-paced modules within seven areas known to support effective teaching of statistics and data science
There are 50+ hours of learning material on the platform, with more to be released in 2025.
The collection of data investigations gives educators a hands-on way to dive into data and experience what may be possible in their classrooms when students use interesting, large data sets to investigate phenomena and various graphs and statistics to answer driving questions. The investigations give teachers access to real-world data sets and include videos of how to explore and model the data using the Common Online Data Analysis Platform, as well as classroom videos illustrating students’ work with data.
