Knowledge about arithmetic mean: a study with future teachers

Abstract

Throughout their school years students experience different trainings and teaching processes which influence their learning of statistic concepts and procedures, taking for granted that, especially for future teachers, these concepts should be well clarified and consolidated. This analysis has as basis a study undertaken with 40 future teachers in the 1st year of the License Degree in Basic Education. The aim was (i) to identify students’ statistical knowledge at the beginning of their degree, and (ii) to assess the influence of the intervention of the curricular unit Numbers and Statistics in the progression of this knowledge (Martins, Pires, & Barros, 2009). An investigation methodology of a qualitative kind has been followed, in which the collection of data has been conducted using a questionnaire applied at the study’s beginning, participant observation during the classes and a summative test at the end. For this presentation we selected the data related to the arithmetic mean.