Our stat course is still relatively new. When we first set it up, we copied the prerequisite used by the other two stat courses on campus (MATH and Business). They listed Finite Math as a prerequisite. After 4 semesters I asked the Registrar for the stat class grade and prior math courses taken by everyone who had taken the PSYC stat course (our system does no prerequisite checking, so students can register for classes that they have not met the prereqs for - but that's another issue). What I found was that students who had taken Finite Math did no better than those who had taken no college-level math. They failed and withdrew at the same rate. Those who had taken a college-level course that gave them a strong background in algebra - either MATH 101 (Intro) or MATH 105 (Algebra) earned higher grades and tended to withdraw from the class less often. So, we changed our pre-requisites. Larry ************************************************************ Larry Z. Daily Associate Professor of Psychology Psychology Department Chair Department of Psychology Free School Shepherd University Shepherdstown, West Virginia 25443 Psychology phone: (304) 876-5297 email: lda...@shepherd.edu WWW: http://webpages.shepherd.edu/LDAILY/index.html Adam's prize was open eyes His sentence was to see - The Dreamer - Tom Rush
________________________________ From: Gerald Peterson [mailto:peter...@svsu.edu] Sent: Fri 1/29/2010 10:33 AM To: Teaching in the Psychological Sciences (TIPS) Subject: [tips] Prep for Psych stats? We had a discussion at a dept. meeting regarding our requirement of a Math class (involves intermediate algebra) for our Psych Statistics class. This Math class is college level and not remedial, and some of our stats instructors feel the math class is at a level above what should be required for our stats class. All of our students have basic math skills and we initially thought this math class should be required to insure basic arithmetical operations. The class now appears to be at a higher level than some think is necessary. I was wondering if other TIPS folks have a Math pre-req for the Psych Stats class and whether it you feel it functions well as a pre-req. My own view is that students should have basic math skills but do not need a higher level college math class before our Stats class. We have an advanced Stat class where students can sharpen their stats thinking and, of course, those going on to grad work in psych (approx 19%) will have further opportunities to develop understanding of more advanced statistical techniques. Thanks for any input/thoughts. Gerald L. (Gary) Peterson, Ph.D. Professor, Department of Psychology Saginaw Valley State University University Center, MI 48710 989-964-4491 peter...@svsu.edu --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: lda...@shepherd.edu. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13350.560a6a01a9fce179d1d3a1d8d56758a3&n=T&l=tips&o=86 or send a blank email to leave-86-13350.560a6a01a9fce179d1d3a1d8d5675...@fsulist.frostburg.edu --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: arch...@jab.org. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=151 or send a blank email to leave-151-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
<<winmail.dat>>
