The Real Data

You want to know who had the real data in each group? Here it is:

Group 1 on Program Satisfaction: Max
Group 2 on Informed Citizens: Alicia
Group 3 on Social Networking: Sean
Group 4 on Chocolate & Learning: Cathy
Group 5 on Vacationing with Kids: Browning

All the other data sets were slightly, moderately, or hugely changed from the original data set.

Report 3 Feedback and Grading

I've finished going over all of the third reports. Overall the class did an excellent job! Congratulations to all of you for a job well done.

I will be sending individualized feedback to each person via email today. The feedback will include Raylene's spreadsheet rubric scoring, my written report rubric scoring (with very short notes), and my markup of your paper. In some cases there's no markup at all, in other cases very little markup.

Grades are not due until early January. With the grading of reports done, you now know 50% of your grade. The other 50 points of your grade will come from your timely submittals of the problem sets (16 points), providing a question and comment at the least for each knowledge dig (16 points), and attendance at the class sessions (18 points). Thankfully Google Docs and the Disqus commenting system will make it easy for me to look up each person's submittals quite easily. And, realistically, you should already know if you submitted problem sets, participated in the discussions, and attended class. I just need to do the clerical work of looking up this info for each person.

Next week I need to be providing feedback for my Multimedia Learning class. Grades might be submitted for Applied Statistics before the January deadline, but likely not much before.

I hope all of you have a great holiday break!

Report 2 Model Paper

I know this is a wee bit late, but it still may help some of you. I'm posting an example of a model paper done for Report 2. As with the first model paper, this report is not perfect and there were others who also wrote great reports. However, for some of you this may be a helpful guide about how to improve your own written research communication. The cover page has been removed to protect the identify of this second (and different) author of a model report.

model report 2 download

Report 3 Structure

I'm posting the Report 3 Structure document I passed out and discussed at our last class. This document provides key hints for how to structure your last report—with special attention given to where you'll add key bits of text to accommodate your correlational analyses. This affects the Research Questions, Results, and Discussion sections mainly. In total, addressing correlation probably adds about three paragraphs to your final report.

report 3 structure download

Report 2 Feedback Completed!

I have just sent out the last feedback packages to students this morning at 11. If you have not received an email from me with a feedback download link then I have an incorrect email address for you, my email is in your spam or junk folder, or something else weird happened. Put differently, contact me immediately about getting your feedback sent out again if you haven't received anything.

The first round of feedback was sent out last Thursday, with groups of feedback also sent out at the end of the business day on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. This morning I completed feedback on the final round of research reports.

Each feedback package contains Raylene's handy spreadsheet rubric and score for your spreadsheet work, my written report rubric and markup of your written document, and an MP3 audio file where I talk through the areas of your report that need corrections or some additional improvement. I hope all of this is useful to each of you.

On Saturday we'll discuss what Report 3 will look like. Overall there will be relatively minor additions to the research questions section, to the results section, and (based on the results) possibly to the discussion section. These additions will all address an additional analysis using correlation.

Report 2 Feedback

I have started sending out feedback on your written reports and spreadsheets. Four feedback packages were sent out Friday, and another four sent today at noon. I'll be sending out a few feedback pages every day up through our next class session.

These are the people who have been sent feedback so far: Alicia, Cathy, Diana, Jennesis, Kathleen, Max, Nasa, and Toby. If one of you did not receive my email and the download link then please contact me as soon as possible about getting the feedback resent to you.

Submitting Report 2

Reports need to be submitted by noon on Saturday November 7th. Please submit electronically using the Uploads page. You can upload both documents at the same time.

Remember that we need your report document in PDF format and your spreadsheet documents in their original format (Excel, Numbers, or whatever spreadsheet program you are using). All Mac-users can save their report as a PDF directly from the print dialog box in any application they are using. Many of the Windows-users will be able to save directly to PDF from within Word (if using the newest version). Some Windows-users may need to create their PDF using the wonderful and free conversion service provided at Zamzar.com.

Example Paper

I am posting one example of a "model" paper. I use that word somewhat loosely since this paper is not perfect in a few ways. You'll easily notice the APA headings are off, for example. Despite the relatively minor flaws, the basic guts of this report demonstrates clear and complete research writing. (I should mention that several other students also had very good papers.)There is no need to download this paper, and the author shall remain anonymous, but it may be helpful for some of you.

report 1 example paper download

Big Caveat:You should view this paper as a general way to approach writing a paper. For example, in this paper the author provides some citations with references at the end. That was fine for the paper, but you should not "extract" from this example that you also need to have citations and references. As per anything in life you need to be a savvy consumer (i.e. savvy extractor of useful tips for your own writing).

Sorting & Multiple Sheets in Excel

A few people have asked questions about sorting in Excel and also how to handle the creation of multiple sheets. I've uploaded a short 5 minute video that explains both of these procedures—just go to the Reports section to view the video. I hope this is helpful to some of you.

Reports section link

Report Data Ready

The survey data you'll be analyzing for your reports is ready to download. Notice that there is now a new Reports section and that there is a old section (Surveys) missing. If you click on the Reports tab you'll find sub-headers. One of those subheaders is the Surveys section that has now be re-filed under reports.

Much more important to each one of you, however, is that you can go to your group's page. I've labelled groups as 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5. The main Reports page tells you who is in each group. Next go to that respective group page (you'll see the sub-header tabs just under the banner image) and you'll find links to download the data for each of your four members.

Please keep in mind that while the data sets for a group are similar, only one person has the actual "true" data set.

You are free to talk to people within, or outside, of your group. However, talking to other people should be in the form of discussing ideas, getting clearer about statistical concepts, or getting clearer about how to use a spreadsheet. Under no circumstances should these other people be doing the analysis or the interpretation of the data for you.