Statistics: Statistical investigations, Level 3
AO1: Conduct investigations using the statistical enquiry cycle:
The statistical enquiry cycle has five phases that relate to each other. Some enquiries follow these phases in sequence but
often new considerations mean that a statistician must go back to previous phases and rethink. The phases are:
At Level Three students should be able to pose questions that they want to investigate, consider the appropriate data they need to collect, gather and sort the data in order to develop an answer to their question. The data involved should be multivariate so it should include many variables, e.g. gender, age, height, eye colour, bedtime, etc., so that relationships between the variables can be explored. Students should be able to ask summary questions (of a variable), e.g. what is the usual range in heights for 10 year old students?, comparison questions, e.g. are girls taller than boys?, and relationship questions, e.g. do older students go to bed later than younger students. Data displays, including tables and graphs, expected at Level Three are tally charts, frequency tables, pictographs, bar graphs, strip graphs, and pie charts for category data, dot plots and stem and leaf graphs for whole-number data, and simple line graphs for time series data. Students should be able to use computer technology to create these displays to find patterns, including trends over time, in data as well as to communicate their findings to others. They should be able to justify their choice of display/s with reference to the patterns they wish to highlight.
Click to download a PDF of second-tier material relating to Level 3 Statistical Investigations (171KB)
