Week 2 · Readings & resources

Week 2 — Readings & Resources

Introduction to Statistics Free sample edition

Your primary reading is Chapter 2 (in this module). Everything below is the optional, go-deeper layer — pick what helps, skip the rest.

How to use this page

This page has 12 items (6 readings and 6 videos). Allow 69–81 minutes for everything. Each group points back to the matching chapter section and class-session segment, so use the full menu when you want more practice, or take the quick path below.

Every video here has captions: turn them on with the CC button in the player. The chapter covers the same ideas in text.

Pick-one quick path (20–22 min total)

① How many in each group? Counting categories and drawing the counts

Chapter 2, Section “Tables and charts for categories: count, share, and picture” · Session 1, Segment 1, “Frequency tables, bar charts, and pie charts” · Remember: a bar chart compares categories, and a pie chart only fits when the shares make one whole.

Charts Are Like Pasta - Data Visualization Part 1: Crash Course Statistics #5 — CrashCourse — a brisk tour of bar charts, pie charts, and picture graphs, and of why the same counts can look honest or dishonest. (video, 10 min) (captions: creator)
Pie charts — Data visualisation: charts, Government Analysis Function — a short section from a government guide on when a pie chart works. Use one for five or fewer categories that make up one whole, and use a bar chart when the slices are close in size. This builds on Week 1's work with classifying variables as categorical or quantitative. (reading, 2–4 min)

② How do you picture numbers? Dot plots, stem plots, and histograms

Chapter 2, Section “Graphs for numbers: dot plots, stem plots, and histograms” · Session 1, Segment 2, “Dot plots, stem plots, and histograms” · Remember: a few values suit dots or leaves, and many values suit equal-width bins.

Plots, Outliers, and Justin Timberlake: Data Visualization Part 2: Crash Course Statistics #6 — CrashCourse — dot plots, stem-and-leaf plots, and histograms side by side, with a first look at values that sit far from the rest. (video, 12 min) (captions: creator)
Statistics - How to make a stem and leaf plot — MySecretMathTutor — a three-minute build of one stem plot from a list of numbers, step by step. (video, 3 min) (captions: creator)
Stem and Leaf Plot — The Data Visualisation Catalogue — a short reference entry on how a stem and leaf plot sorts values by place value so every value stays readable, and on when a data set is too small or too large for one. Its example labels the stems 0, 10, and 20, where the chapter writes just the tens digit. (reading, 2–3 min)

③ Which way does it lean? Describing a distribution's shape

Chapter 2, Section “Shape: read the tail, the peaks, and the stragglers” · Session 2, Segment 3, “Describing shape” · Remember: name the skew by the tail, the long thin side, never by where the pile sits.

Histograms - Shape of Data — Travis J Nelson — symmetric, uniform, unimodal, bimodal, and skewed shapes, each sketched as a histogram. (video, 8 min) (captions: automatic)
Measures of shape — Australian Bureau of Statistics — symmetric and skewed shapes, each named by the side with the longer tail, plus shapes with one or two peaks. The page calls right skew positive and left skew negative. Skip the bell-curve part for now. Use it while working through the Week-2 module overview. (reading, 4–6 min)

④ What does the table or graph really say? Two-way tables and misleading graphs

Chapter 2, Section “Misleading graphs: catch the trick before it catches you” · Session 2, Segment 4, “Two-way tables and misleading graphs” · Remember: read a cell's row and column labels first, and check that a bar chart's axis starts at zero.

Working with Two-Way Frequency Tables — numberninja — reading and completing a two-way table from its row and column totals. (video, 10 min) (captions: automatic)
Two-Way Tables — Stat Trek — read the part on two-way frequency tables; the relative-frequency tables and segmented bar charts further down are a preview you can skip for now. (reading, 5–8 min)
Misleading Graphs — Linda Green — six minutes on graphs that mislead: cut-off axes, axis ranges picked to blow up or flatten a change, and pictures whose size overstates a difference. (video, 6 min) (captions: automatic)
Misleading Graphs and Stats — Math is Fun — read the parts on cutting the y-axis and on pictograph pitfalls; the rest of the page is optional. (reading, 3–5 min)

Optional one-stop reference (free online reference)

1.3.3.14 Histogram — NIST/SEMATECH e-Handbook of Statistical Methods — a federal standards body's reference page on what a histogram shows: center, spread, skew, outliers, and more than one peak; read the purpose and the questions it answers, and skip the links to related techniques. (reading, 4–6 min)

Heads-up (links rot): these point to outside sites that occasionally move or rename pages. If a link ever fails, tell your instructor and use the reference above in the meantime.

Provenance: Built with The Course Maker · samples.thecoursemaker.com