A design experiment where students in Grade 5 (11-12 years old) play the Color Run game constitutes the context for investigating how students can be introduced to informal hypothesis testing. The result outlines a three-step hypothetical learning trajectory on informal hypothesis testing. In the first step, students came to favor sample space…

Tertiary mathematics has a central place in teacher education, yet in recent years there is growing evidence that realizing its potential affordances in secondary mathematics teaching is far from trivial. Research suggests that utilizing tertiary mathematics in secondary teaching requires interweaving it with knowledge for teaching secondary…

Many people are unduly intimidated by the thought of teaching probability. At its most basic level, probability revolves around being able to predict whether a future event is certain, possible, or impossible. These basic concepts grow and develop into a more mathematical understanding of likelihood as children learn to quantify that…

A formula is derived for a 'two-dice horse race', in which two ordinary dice are thrown repeatedly and each time the sum of the scores determines which horse (numbered 2 to 12) moves forward one space. This paper answers a question posed in a former "Teaching Statistics" article, and demonstrates the value of simulation.

Probability requires teaching approaches that allow children to predict, observe and experiment with concreate materials, games and simulations. In this study, we explored one teacher's beliefs and practices of teaching probability using game-based approaches. We employed a design-based research approach to explore how our case study teacher…

There is much debate about the place of probability in an introductory statistics course. While students may or may not use probability distributions in their post-collegiate lives, they will likely be faced with day-to-day decisions that require a probabilistic assessment of risk and reward. This paper describes an innovative way to teach…

Aotearoa New Zealand is a super diverse nation in terms of the ethnicities of its people and languages spoken. With an increased rate of immigration from various parts of the world, the presence of multiple languages in many domains of social life is a reality. Consequently, classrooms are now places where learners have different linguistic and…

The two most popular decision-making processes are tossing a coin and playing rock, paper, scissors. In the activity described in this article, students find the theoretical probabilities of winning a coin toss and a round of the rock, paper, scissors game. They next devise strategies to win and test them out. Students then compare the theoretical…

The Monty Hall Dilemma (MHD), made famous by the television game show Let's Make a Deal, can be an effective teaching tool with wide ranging behavioral science applications. The format and history of the problem are presented as well as experimental data and variations on the original design. Strategic game playing choices are discussed from…

Purpose: This study reports the effects of the developed localized mobile game "Hangaway Game" on the performance of Grade 11 students in Statistics and Probability. Methodology: The quasi-experimental design of research (Ary, Jacobs, & Razavish, 1996) was used in this study. Prior to the conduct of research, the mobile game…

Probability education has fast become a contested area, with curriculum authorities in some countries recently suspending its introduction until the post-primary years. In other countries, children as young as 7 years are introduced to informal probability concepts. These recent international shifts in practice have contributed to a paucity of…

This article describes the incorporation of a dice game (piggy) to teach food safety hazards and risk in an engaging way in HACCP classes. Each player accumulates points by rolling two dice, but loses points in a turn when rolling a 7, or all accumulated points when rolling two consecutive doubles. This game helps explain the difference between a…

One of the highest ambitions in educational technology is the move towards personalized learning. To this end, computerized adaptive learning (CAL) systems are developed. A popular method to track the development of student ability and item difficulty, in CAL systems, is the Elo Rating System (ERS). The ERS allows for dynamic model parameters by…

Research shows that playing games in the classroom improves students' attitudes toward mathematics, increases motivation to practice skills inside and outside the classroom, and increases learning by encouraging students of all levels to participate. Rutherford asserts that playing games encourages strategic mathematical thinking and supports…

The dice game Farkle provides an excellent basis for four activities that reinforce probability and expected value concepts for students in an introductory statistics class. These concepts appear in the increasingly popular AP statistics course (Peck 2011) and are used in analyzing ethical issues from insurance and gambling (COMAP 2009; Woodward…