Adam+J

Here are my reflections; It is always best to start a statistical investigation with a question- you need to identify what you are trying to find out, and this will help you identify the best data to collect, and it will also help you to create a clear conclusion. Your data collection needs to be more organised and systematic. Apart from the fact that your sample is a bit small (and I realise this is because we only have a limited number of students in OUR OWN sample), the ordering of the data is strange, because your table climbs in hundredths sometimes but in tenths at others. A tally is best if you want to group the data- a grouped frequency chart would have been effective in this case. The box/ whisker is a good idea, and carefully drawn BUT is not labelled, has no axes, and is impossible to distinguish between the 2 sample groups. Finally, there are no conclusions or observations, no averages or statistics used to summarise your findings. I'm disappointed that this is the result of several weeks of study.


 * //To use data and statistics/ To use mathematical inquiry// ||
 * Stage 1; Identify the problem and form a question || Clear question- it is an interesting concept- how did you come up with this thought? What made it worth investigating (think about a possible 'So What' from what you will hopefully find out.) ||
 * Stage 2; Plan and hypothesise || You have planned a very big sample- this is good (but time consuming) as it gives your results added validity, and any patterns or trends in the data are likely to be true. You mentioned the accuracy of your prediction, but I couldn't find it in your planning. ||
 * Stage 3; Data collection || Excellent depth in your data- thanks for attaching it! ||
 * Stage 4; Analysis of data || You also looked in more depth by calculating averages of the data- but you could have produced a bit more useful information by calculating the other statistical averages of median and mode (I don't think range would have been very informative because I can see a -100 and +100 in each set of data!) ||
 * Stage 5; Graphing and charting your data || Clear and simple graphs- make use of the ICT in school whenever possible- something like excel gives more accuracy to your graphs but well constructed anyway! They do show some interesting results... ||
 * Stage 6; Interrogating your graphed data || Take time to look at each set of data and any similarities or discrepancies- for example, where were girls more or less confident? also, which group had the biggest gap between the genders? Look closely and ask yourself questions about the data. ||
 * Stage 7; Conclusion, answer and 'So What' || Well done for mentioning your prediction and going back to your original question. What do you think we should learn from your survey? What's the 'So What?' we need to think about? Where could we try to improve confidence in the different groups? ||