I agree - although students do need tables in (written) exams....... But
we use a computer program called Tuteman in our teaching and testing, so
the natural way to find critical values or p-values is via the computer
- we use Excel mainly. In general, I emphasise the use of p values - in
many ways it is a more natural way than using critical values to carry
out a test. The p value is a direct measure of 'strength of evidence'.
Alan
"Paul W. Jeffries" wrote:
>
> Robert Dawson said that one of his approaches to dealing with z test is to
> treat it as a historical anecdote. I like that approach and must give it
> a try.
>
> But this approach made me think about artifacts in statistics. What are
> list members views on teaching students to use tables. In the computer
> age, tables are an anachronism. The vast majority of students will never
> use a t table. They will just rely on the computer to print the p value.
> And those rare students that might want to check something on a table will
> probably be the ones who know enough stats so that they can quickly figure
> out how to read a table. Does fussing with tables get in the way of
> students' understanding hypothesis testing or do tables help?
>
> I am interested to hear the views of list members.
>
> Paul W. Jeffries
> Department of Psychology
> SUNY--Stony Brook
> Stony Brook NY 11794-2500
>
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--
Alan McLean ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
Department of Econometrics and Business Statistics
Monash University, Caulfield Campus, Melbourne
Tel: +61 03 9903 2102 Fax: +61 03 9903 2007
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