ICOTS10 (2018) Contributed Paper Kroisandt, Andersson

USING PLAYFUL LEARNING IN A LARGE CLASSROOM

INTRODUCTORY STATISTICS COURSE

Christina Andersson1 and Gerald Kroisandt2

1
Frankfurt University of Applied Sciences, Germany
2
HTW Saar, Germany
andersso@fb2.fra-uas.de

Teaching an introductory statistics course to non-statistics students is often a challenge. One of the
problems is lack of motivation among the students. An additional aggravating issue in the course
Statistics in the B.Sc. program Computer Science is the large classroom setting of the course. To
increase the motivation of the students, we have introduced three different playful approaches to
statistics in the introductory statistics course. We explain how these approaches successfully could
be applied, still using the constraint that the course should be taught as a large classroom course.
Furthermore, we discuss the results of the first in-class usage of the playful approaches.

INTRODUCTION
The Computer Science students at Frankfurt University of Applied Sciences (FRA-UAS)
are in general not very interested in taking courses in statistics, since these courses do not address
the main core of their study program. One way to increase engagement, motivation and interest is
to introduce game-based learning in the teaching framework (Hamari et. al., 2016, Bailey et. al.,
1999, Ke, 2008, Kapp, 2012, Benek-Rivera & Mathews, 2004, Sarason & Banbury, 2004, Meyers
& Jones, 1993, Rice, 2009). Research indicates that game-based learning also is effective for e.g.
the understanding of mathematical concepts (Randel et. al., 1992), to improve students’ attitudes to
mathematical topics (Afari et. al., 2013) and to show that learning is allowed to take place as an
enjoyable process (Kim, 1995). Several studies show how different game components have been
introduced to enhance learning (Murphy, 2005, Leach & Sugarman, 2005, Bodnar et. al., 2016,
Chow et. al., 2011), also especially the learning of statistical topics (Leao et. al., 2017, Bakke et.
al., 2008, Walker & Loch, 2014). Many approaches make use of familiar games, but adapted to an
educational setting, e.g. Jeopardy, Bingo and puzzles (Revere, 2004, Keck, 2000, Flores, 1991,
Forman & Forman, 2008, Chiang et. al., 2005, Murhpy, 2005, Benek-Rivera & Mathews, 2004).
This is also the starting point in this paper, describing how three playful approaches can be applied
to a large classroom course in undergraduate statistics for Computer Science students.

CURRENT SITUATION
Statistics in the Computer Science Curriculum
Statistics has, among the non-core topics, a strong position in the Computer Science
curriculum at FRA-UAS. The students start with the mandatory basic course Statistics in the B.Sc.
program Computer Science, followed by the courses Introductory Data Analysis, Data Mining
Methods and Multivariate Data Analysis in the M.Sc. program High Integrity Systems. Most
students consider the undergraduate course in statistics to be unnecessary and a waste of time, but
at the latest when they want to start their master’s thesis in e.g. data science, many of them finally
realize the importance of the topic.

Teaching Framework for the Undergraduate Course in Statistics

The undergraduate course in statistics is a large classroom course with approximately 100
participants. The teaching framework is the classical face-to-face taught situation consisting of
lectures and exercise sessions. In the lectures, all students are taught at the same time, but in the
exercise sessions, the students are partitioned into groups with about 40 students in each group. The
course ends with a written exam.

THREE PLAYFUL APPROACHES

Approach 1: A Jeopardy-style game
This game is based on the setting of the popular television game show Jeopardy and
adapted to be conducted in the statistics lecture. We arrange 25 items in five categories on a board,

In M. A. Sorto, A. White, & L. Guyot (Eds.), Looking back, looking forward. Proceedings of the
Tenth International Conference on Teaching Statistics (ICOTS10, July, 2018), Kyoto, Japan.
Voorburg, The Netherlands: International Statistical Institute. iase-web.org [© 2018 ISI/IASE]
ICOTS10 (2018) Contributed Paper Kroisandt, Andersson

as presented in Figure 1, with the easiest items having the lowest value, expressed in euro. The
current player selects an item and a clue is given in the form of an answer. The player should then
formulate the corresponding question in a correct way to gain the euro value of the item. If the
player fails to pose the correct question, then the corresponding euro value is deducted from the
player’s accumulated scores. The player, who has the highest accumulated scores when all items
have been processed, is the winner of the game. The template for the Jeopardy-like game has been
created with the presentation program LibreOffice Impress.

Figure 1. Example of the Jeopardy-style game.

Approach 2: A Bingo-like game

Each student receives a 5ˣ5 card with statistics-related concepts and numbers, as illustrated
in Figure 2. The concepts are randomly drawn from a database, i.e. mostly the students have unique
cards, at least concerning the placements of the concepts and numbers. The game host, i.e. the
lecturer, asks the students statistical questions, which have answers that can be found among the
possible concepts and numbers. Similar to the original Bingo-game, the students mark the
occurring spaces and the goal is to be the first to have a whole row or column with selected spaces.
The first student, who reaches the goal, calls out “Bingo!” and the game host checks the correctness
of the winning card. To strengthen the learning effect, the game host finally discusses the questions
and solutions with the students.

Figure 2. Example of the Bingo-like game.

Approach 3: A puzzle of a statistical strategy

In this game, we consider a basic statistical problem, which at the introductory level can be
divided into consecutive steps. To each step, we generate a large number of solution statements, out
of one is the correct partial solution and the other ones are false proposals. The students, working in
groups, are provided with the statistical problem and an envelope containing all correct and false
solution snippets. Their task is then to identify the proper snippets and in this way construct a
correct solution to the problem. Figure 3 shows the suggested solution snippets to the step where
the null hypothesis is constructed in a statistical test.

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ICOTS10 (2018) Contributed Paper Kroisandt, Andersson

Figure 3. Example of some pieces of a puzzle.

APPLICATION OF THE PLAYFUL APPROACHES

Approach 1: A Jeopardy-style game
We divided the lecture group into five teams, i.e. there were approximately 20 students in
each team. These five teams answered the questions alternating, which means that for each board
every group answered five questions. In one lecture, usually two rounds, i.e. two boards, were
processed. It was possible to conduct this game in the large classroom setting, even if a team size of
20 members means that there is almost no cooperation within the teams. In the course evaluation,
the students were enthusiastic about this approach, commenting that the format is an unusual and
exciting way to learn statistics. Even if the students express a positive feedback, we see the danger
with this approach that mostly the best students of the groups are active players, since the weaker
students don’t want to give a bad impact to the group if they fail to process the item in a correct
way.

Approach 2: A Bingo-like game

We used the Bingo-like game in some of the lectures of the course, in order to summarize
what we had done so far in the course. The students appreciated this alternation to the standard
summary in the lecture-format. This game is uncomplicated to conduct in a large classroom, since
the game host can manage the whole group at the same time and no individual coaching is needed.
All students are equally involved in the game, since it is played individually. The straightforward
setting makes the game effortless to conduct within the normal time frame of the lecture.

Approach 3: A puzzle of a statistical strategy

We applied this approach to the strategy for conducting a classical hypothesis test. This
problem has been chosen, since many students find hypothesis tests difficult and abstract
(Holland, 2007). A hypothesis test problem was partitioned into seven steps (construction of the
null hypothesis, construction of the alternative hypothesis, selection of the significance level,
construction of the test statistic, computation of the rejection region, comparison of test statistic and
rejection region, conclusion) with totally about 100 correct and false partial solution snippets. The
students worked together in groups of five students. Since the groups worked rather independently,
the game was possible to realize in the large classroom setting. To cover the tuition of this
approach, two game leaders were needed, with each game leader responsible for coaching ten
groups.

CONCLUSION AND FUTURE WORK

The first two approaches, the Jeopardy-style game and the Bingo-like game, were easily
applied in a large classroom setting, whereas the puzzle approach could be applied with an
additional tutor. In the course feedback, the puzzle game was considered to be the most difficult
task, but all games were evaluated positively. This result encourages us to extend the use of game-
based activities in the statistics courses in the future, e.g. by varying the games or by using these
three approaches in further courses.

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ICOTS10 (2018) Contributed Paper Kroisandt, Andersson

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