The purpose of this study is to analyze the statistical reasoning levels of preservice elementary school teachers. With this purpose, pre-service teachers consisting of 29 groups worked on a model eliciting activity (MEA) in scope of an elective course they were taking. At the end of the class, they were asked to present their solutions while working on the MEA in form of a detailed report. The data of the study consisted of these reports and solution sheets. Content analysis method was used in the analysis of the data. As a result, it was found that when the participants were asked to interpret a data set in a table, they could not establish a relationship between measurements of central tendency and variation, and their reasoning was limited or mistaken. The general tendency when pre-service teachers encounter a data set is that they think the only value representing the data set is the arithmetic mean. Additionally, it was found that, although the pre-service teachers were able to correctly compute the measures of variation such as standard deviation and interquartile range, they did not have sufficient knowledge about what these measures tell us about the variation of the data set.
Accepted: 27 October 2016
Keywords
Statistical reasoning Model eliciting activity Pre-service teachers Central tendency Variation
IntroductionEven if we are not a statistics expert, while we are examining data in our hands, some points might get our attention and inspire curiosity in us. Do the data consist of values close to each other, or are there outliers? If we wanted to represent this value with only one number, what would it be? How do we proceed to reach this value that will represent the data set and maybe lead us to reach the correct result? Such questions may run through our heads. As a matter of facts, all of us encounter large amount of data in our daily lives without knowing about it, and use statistics to make a correct decision regarding these data. In the decisions we make, while some of us use statistically correct reasoning, some of us may tend toward wrong decisions and be mistaken because of the limitations in our knowledge or experience. The importance of statistical reasoning, which is significantly effective in the decisions we make, is undeniable. So, how can we define statistical reasoning? Chervany, Collier, Fienberg, Johnson and Neter (1977), who were some of the people who defined statistical reasoning first, defined it as: a) what a student is able to do with statistical content (for instance, recalling, recognizing, distinguishing statistical concepts), and b) the skill shown by students in using statistical concepts in specific problem solving steps. On their definition, the researchers also added the property of statistical reasoning that it is not a directly observable process. The researchers, starting with this property of statistical reasoning, indicated that this skill may only be observed while working on a specific task. Statistical reasoning includes making sense of statistical information ...