An Empirical Investigation On Statistical Literacy Of Grade One Students Of A Key Senior High School In Shandong Province

With the rapid development of economic globalization and information society, every day people receive a lot of information and data from broadcast, TV, newspapers, magazines and network. It has become a basic ability for each citizen to collect, sort, analyze and select information. According to Mathematics Curriculum Standards in the Phase of Full-time Compulsory Education published in 2001 and Mathematics Curriculum Standards in Senior High School published in 2003, statistics, together with number and algebra, space and figures, has become an important part in mathematics teaching in senior high school. Various countries have attached great importance to "statistical education", and it has become a hotspot in international mathematics education to carry out studies on statistics teaching and learning from the perspective of "statistical literacy". The research questions of this thesis are: What statistical literacy shall grade one students of senior high school have? What are the basic components for statistical literacy? What are the factors influencing statistical literacy?On the basis of summarizing studies relating to statistical literacy both at home and abroad, this article tries to give some reflection on the definition of "statistical literacy". Guided by the four important factors of statistical literacy, namely, statistical knowledge, statistical activity, conditional knowledge of statistical problem and critical thinking of statistical judgment, the author designs a questionnaire, selects 404 grade one students of a key senior high school in Shandong as the target group, and carries out empirical study. In order to study the influence of the students' participation in statistical activity on relevant factors, before carrying out the test the author divides 165 students into groups to carry out statistical investigation, and carries out study as test groups. Based on this study and in the hope of improving statistics teaching, the author brings forward seven suggestions on how to enhance statistical literacy of students in statistics teaching.This study leads to the following conclusions:1. Statistical literacy is defined as the ability to use statistical knowledge to explain statistical phenomena in real life, on such basis, to use relevant conditional knowledge and statistical knowledge to carry out critical thinking on relevant statistical judgment, and to make decision accordingly. 2. The teacher should give the direction suggestions on the meaning and feasibility of the student's statistical investigations ; the teacher need to revise the investigation' questionair since the students have not learned how to desige a questionair ; if the students collect the data through the internet, the teacher need to remind of them about the representation of the swatch ; the teacher should provide the learning resource about how to coordinate and analyze the data , then the sudents can use the computer to analyze the data ; the students are not so familiar with the style of the statistical report, so the teacher need to provide a moulding board .3. Among the four important factors of statistical literacy, namely, statistical knowledge, statistical activity, conditional knowledge of statistical problem and critical thinking on statistical judgment, the students do well in the mastery of statistical knowledge, lack understanding about the basic process of "statistical activity", and need to improve their level of critical thinking on statistical judgment.4. Compared with those of controlled group, except "statistical knowledge", there is notable difference in "statistical activity", "conditional knowledge of statistical problem" and "critical thinking on statistical judgment" for the groups taking part in the statistical investigation. Taking part in the statistical investigation may effectively enhance the students' statistical literacy.This article includes five parts:In the first part, the author summarizes studies relating to statistical literacy both at home and abroad, gets the definition of statistical literacy, analyzes significance of this study, and forms basic framework of this article.In the second part, the author introduces the statistical investigation which was carried out in a key senior high school in Shandong in June, 2008 before carrying out the test. 165 students were divided into 22 groups to carry out statistical investigation. The author uses these students as test groups to study the influence of the students' taking part in statistical investigation on their statistical literacy.In the third part, the author elaborates coding standards for the questionnaire, study design, and the implementation process.The fourth part is results and analyses of the questionnaire, which is the core of this study. The author carefully analyzes the questionnaire, and discusses current condition of statistical literacy of grade one students of senior high school and relevant influencing factors.In the fifth part, according to the analyses on test results of the study, the author summarizes conclusion of the study and brings forward suggestions and teaching measures on how to cultivate statistical literacy of students of senior high school. At the same time, the author points out deficiencies of the study and brings forward suggestions on further studies on statistical literacy.