MIS 24056 Summer I 2012 Shanker

M&IS 24056:Fundamentals of Business Statistics

Summer 2012

 

Course Description

This course is an introduction to concepts in statistical methods and their applications to real-world problems. This course will examine both the theoretical and practical side of the different methods. Students will be given ample opportunities to apply the techniques to different problems. The goal of the course is for students to understand fundamental statistical concepts and methods, and their applications.

Course Requirements

Last day to withdraw from a course: 

Sunday, 24 June 2012

 

Prerequisites:

 Math 11011 (Algebra).  Students attending the course who do not have the proper prerequisite risk being deregistered from the class.

 

Enrollment

: Students have responsibility to ensure they are properly enrolled in classes. You are advised to review your official class schedule (using Student Tools on FlashLine) during the first two weeks of the semester to ensure you are properly enrolled in this class and section. Should

you find an error in your class schedule, you have until Thursday, 7 June 2012

to

correct the error. If registration errors are not corrected by this date and you continue to

attend and participate in classes for which you are not officially enrolled, you are advised now

that you will not

receive a grade at the conclusion of the semester for any class in which you

are not properly registered.

 

Students With Disabilities: University policy 3342-3-18 requires that students with disabilities be provided reasonable accommodations to ensure their equal access to course content. If you have documented disability and require accommodations, please contact the instructor at the beginning of the semester to make arrangements for necessary classroom adjustments. Please note, you must first verify your eligibility for these through the Student Disability Services (contact 330-672-3391 or visit http://www.registrars.kent.edu/disability

for more information on registration procedures).

Class Time

There are no class times. This class is completely web based, and students can access the materials anytime during the course offerings. Remember to complete ALL requirements for the course by 7 July 2012.

 

Lectures:

I have recorded multimedia lectures from classes that I taught during Fall 2011 and Spring 2012. These lectures capture what I did in class, and you will find them under Lesson Plans. The lectures are arranged by date. As such, lectures from Spring 2012 are arranged in increasing order, and then lectures from Fall 2011. It is possible that you might have two lectures on the same content. As each semester, I tend to change my lectures, you might benefit from a different explanation. Start with Chapter 1.

 

Assessments

There are several types of online assessments, and two ways in which you will take them; Through your course Blackboard Learn website, and through ALEKS.

 

Blackboard Learn: This is the new course management software for Kent State University. You can access your course in two ways.

• Log into Flashline. Click on Student Tools and Courses tab, and then Blackboard Single Signon. Next, choose Log in to LEARN.
• Or, you can log in by going directly to https://learn.kent.edu. Log in with your Kent username and password.

Online testing on this website will primarily consist of taking examinations. Examinations will consist of multiple choice, true or false, fill-in-the blanks, short-answer, matching, and calculation type questions.

 

There will be 3 examinations. Each examination is worth 20 points. Each exam (including the final) will take approximately 75 minutes. All examinations are cumulative. You will have only one attempt to take each examination. From the first two examinations, Exams 1, and 2, only the best

examination score will be considered. Exam 3 (Final Exam) is required for all students. Students will receive a score of 0 for any missed examination. Thus, the maximum score from examinations is 40.

 

While examinations can be taken in any order, as examinations are cumulative, I recommend that you take them in order. For each examination, you will find practice examinations, and links to practice quizzes on the publisher’s website. Please take these before taking the actual examination.

 

ALEKS: Assessment and LEarning in Knowledge Spaces is a Web-based, artificially intelligent assessment and learning system. ALEKS will constitute a significant part of your online time and work. To access it, go tohttp://www.aleks.com

and log in with your username and password that you created during sign up.

 

Several types of assessments will be used as part of ALEKS. These include:

• Percentage of Course Goals Mastered: Various statistical topics are presented as a pie chart in ALEKS. As students learn and master the topics, the proportion of the pie that is mastered increases. Every student must satisfy a minimum percentage of mastery to get points. There are a total of 77 topics in ALEKS. While students have the flexibility and option to proceed at their own pace, note that all requirements must be completed by 7 July 2012. The maximum points from this is 40.
• Quizzes: There will be 9 Quizzes on ALEKS. Out of these, I will consider the best 8 quizzes. Each Quiz is worth 5 points, giving a total of 40 points from ALEKS for quizzes.

 

The following table summarizes the points that can be earned through ALEKS.

 

 

All online testing material can be taken from anywhere (home, work, school, BSA computer labs, in the airport, from a hammock sipping Mango juice, etc.) the student has access to the Web. Please use a standards-compliant browser like Mozilla Firefox or Google Chrome

to take all online assessments.

 

All tests are open-book, open notes, but before taking any test, the student will be asked to indicate his/her agreement to an Academic Honesty Statement. This statement will certify that the student agrees to abide by university rules on cheating, and any failure to do so will result in a failing grade. Thus, for example, while you are allowed to use books and notes for the tests, it is cheating if you ask other students to help you while taking the tests. This statement is available online at your course website on Blackboard Learn. Do this first before doing anything else

.

 

Dates and Timings

: All requirements for this class must be completed by 7 July 2012.

 

Academic dishonesty: Cheating means to misrepresent the source, nature, or other conditions of your academic work (e.g., tests, papers, cases, online quizzes) so as to get undeserved credit. The use of the intellectual property of others without giving them appropriate credit is a serious academic offense. It is the University's policy that cheating or plagiarism result in receiving a failing grade for the work or course. Repeat offenses result in dismissal from the University. Students must indicate their acceptance to this policy before they are allowed to take any quiz or exam. As soon as you log into your Blackboard course website, please take the Academic Honesty Statement

quiz first. You will not have access to any other quiz or exam until you do so.

Grades

The following table summarizes the maximum points that can be earned in the course.

 

 

The grading scale for this class is as follows

• None of the examinations, quizzes,  or assignments, can be made up. You will receive a score of zero (0) for any missed assessment.
• Please print and keep a copy of your tests after each exam or quiz. That will be the proof I will require if there are any disputes about test scores. 
• You will have one week after receiving the score for each assessment to request any corrections.

Class Materials

JMP statistical software. This is required software. Please go to http://www.kent.edu/is/helpdesk/sas.cfm to get your software. Note that University licensing provides this software at no cost to you. Please access the extensive help menu system in JMP to learn how to use it. Also, the multimedia lectures show you how to use JMP for various topics. You will need to use JMP for Exam 3.

 

Book. I will be using “Introduction to the Practice of Statistics,” by David Moore and George McCabe, 7th edition as the guide for the materials in class. The chapters in ALEKS match the chapter numbers of this book. Versions 6 is equally suitable.  This is not a required book, and most students have done well in my classes without a book. But, if you do want to get a book, here are some cost-effective options:

1. The latest edition is the 7th, so the 6th edition is available cheaply. http://www.chegg.com/details/introduction-to-the-practice-of-statistics/1429216220/
2. Ultimately, whether you want to buy a book, and which edition you want, is up to you. The book is not required.

ALEKS. To use ALEKS, you must first purchase an access code. This can be done as follows:

1. Go tohttp://www.mhprofessional.com/mhhe_product.php?isbn=007764476X&cat=108. The cost is $75.65.

Once you purchase ALEKS, you should receive an individual access code. Then,

1. Go to http://www.aleks.com
2. Click on the link marked Sign Up Now
3. Enter your 10 digit personal Access Code
4. You will also be asked to enter a COURSE CODE. The course code is Business Statistics / Summer 2012:  ALMER-AMC3D
5. Use the same userid, and email address as your Kent UserID when creating the account. That will allow me to match student information.

 

Lecture Notes.

Class slides and multimedia lectures are available under Lesson Plans in Learn.

Please Do The Following Immediately

• Log into Blackboard, and answer the quiz on Academic Honesty. 

• Purchase and register for ALEKS

 

Course Schedule

 

 

 

ALEKS - FAQ

What is ALEKS?

ALEKS stands for Assessment and LEarning in Knowledge Spaces. ALEKS is a Web-based, artificially intelligent assessment and learning system. ALEKS uses adaptive questioning to quickly and accurately determine exactly what a student knows and doesn't know in a course. ALEKS then instructs the student on the topics she is most ready to learn. As a student works through a course, ALEKS periodically reassesses the student to ensure that topics learned are also retained. ALEKS courses are very complete in their topic coverage and ALEKS avoids multiple-choice questions. A student who shows a high level of mastery of an ALEKS course will be successful in the actual course she is taking.

Initial Assessment

Before you start using ALEKS to learn, you will be given an initial assessment. Please keep the following points in mind.

1. Your first ALEKS assessment will determine the topics you already know, the topics that you don't yet know, and, most importantly, those that you are ready to learn.
2. Here is some additional information about the assessment:
1. It consists of about 30 open response questions (not multiple choice).
2. It has no time limit. You may take breaks or stop the assessment and return to ALEKS at another time.
3. You should have a pencil and paper with you in order to work through the answers.
3. You should not ask for, nor receive any help during assessments. If you receive help, the system will get a wrong idea of what you are most ready to learn, and this will hold up your progress.
4. You should do your best on all questions. If you don't know the answer, you may click "I don't know."

This assessment is NOT GRADED. Do not ask for help, as it will make your learning more difficult as ALEKS will then have an incorrect assessment.

Assessment Results

1. Assessment results are presented in the form of a color-coded pie chart.
2. Slices of the pie chart correspond to parts of the syllabus.
3. The relative size of the slices represents the importance of each topic area for the syllabus.
4. The darker part of each slice indicates the portion of the topics already mastered. The lighter part of each slice indicates the portion of topics still to be learned.
5. The topics that you are ready to learn will be listed as you place the mouse pointer over each slice.
6. Not all slices will contain concepts at any given time. They may have been mastered already, or work may need to be done in other slices before they become available.
7. You may choose any listed topics and begin learning.

Guidelines for Effective Use

1. You should have pencil and paper ready for all assessments and for use in the Learning Mode.
2. Basic calculators should be used only when the ALEKS Calculator button is active. A basic calculator is part of ALEKS but is only made available for use when appropriate.
3. Nothing is more important to your progress than regular use of the system. Six hours per week is a recommended minimum. Put ALEKS into your weekly schedule and stick to it!
4. You will be given additional assessments each time you have learned about 20 topics or spent about five hours in ALEKS.

You can find the complete user guide for ALEKS at http://www.aleks.com/user_guides/learners-bstat. Take time to peruse that guide.

What Topics will I Learn Using ALEKS

Based on our course, I have selected approximately 77 different topics, organized into 9 sections, to learn. The complete syllabus for ALEKS is given below. The chapter numbers and heading refer to the textbook specified in this syllabus. While there are no due dates for each topic, thus giving maximum flexibility for student learning, it is advisable that students proceed at a pace to match the topics in a class.

 

 

   

          

          

 

        

 

     

                  

   

Chapter 0 (19 topics, no due date) - Mathematical Readiness

• Order of operations: Problem type 1
• Order of operations: Problem type 2
• Decimal place value
• Rounding decimals
• Converting between percentages and decimals
• Percentage of a whole number
• Writing a ratio as a percentage
• Converting a percentage to a fraction
• Converting a fraction to a percentage
• Summation of indexed data
• Solving a two-step equation with integers
• Solving a linear equation with several occurrences of the variable: Problem type 1
• Solving a linear equation with several occurrences of the variable: Problem type 3
• Y-intercept of a line
• X- and y-intercepts of a line given the equation in standard form
• Writing an equation of a line given the y-intercept and a point
• Graphing a line given the x- and y-intercepts
• Graphing a line given its equation in slope-intercept form
• Graphing a line through a given point with a given slope

Chapter 1 (26 topics, no due date) - Looking at Data Distributions

• Interpreting pie charts
• Computations from pie charts
• Double bar charts
• Histograms for grouped data
• Interpreting relative frequency histograms
• Cumulative distributions and ogives
• Interpreting a stem-and-leaf display
• Using back-to-back stem-and-leaf displays to compare data sets
• Classification of variables and levels of measurement
• Comparing means without calculation
• Comparing standard deviations without calculation
• Box-and-whisker plots
• Mean, median, and mode: Computations
• Rejecting unreasonable claims based on average statistics
• Weighted mean: Tabular data
• Percentiles
• Population standard deviation
• Sample standard deviation
• Mean, median, and mode: Comparisons
• Chebyshev's theorem and the empirical rule
• Standard normal probabilities
• Standard normal values: Basic
• Standard normal values: Advanced
• Normal versus standard normal density curves
• Normal distribution raw scores
• Normal distribution: Word problems

Chapter 2 (5 topics, no due date) Looking at Data Relationships

• Linear relationship and the sample correlation coefficient
• Sketching the least-squares regression line
• Predictions from the least-squares regression line
• Computing the sample correlation coefficient and the coefficients for the least-squares regression line
• Calculating relative frequencies in a contingency table

Chapter 4 (8 topics, no due date) Probability - The Study of Randomness

• Outcomes and event probability
• Die rolling
• Discrete versus continuous variables
• Discrete probability distribution: Basic
• Discrete probability distribution: Word problems
• Transforming the mean and standard deviation of a data set
• Expectation and variance of a random variable
• Marginal distributions of two discrete random variables

Chapter 5 (1 topic, no due date) - Sampling Distributions

• Central limit theorem: Sample mean

Chapter 6 (5 topics, no due date) - Introduction to Inference

• Confidence interval for the population mean: Use of the standard normal
• Choosing an appropriate sample size
• Determining null and alternative hypotheses
• Hypothesis test for the population mean: Z test
• Type I and Type II errors

Chapter 7 (4 topics, no due date) - Inference for Distributions

• t distribution
• Selecting a distribution for inferences on the population mean
• Confidence interval for the population mean: Use of the t distribution
• Hypothesis test for the population mean: t test

Chapter 10 (3 topics, no due date) - Inference for Regression

• Explained and unexplained variation and the least-squares regression line
• Confidence intervals and prediction intervals from simple linear regression
• Hypothesis tests for the correlation coefficient and the slope of the least-squares regression line

Chapter 11 (6 topics, no due date) - Multiple Regression

• Interpreting the regression coefficients
• Identifying degrees of freedom
• ANOVA table: Problem type 1
• ANOVA table: Problem type 2
• F test of a multiple regression model
• t test of a multiple regression model