APPLICATIONS OF A COMPUTER ALGEBRA SYSTEM FOR TEACHING BIVARIATE RELATIONSHIPS IN STATISTICS COURSES

Maple, a computer algebra system, is used in undergraduate psychology courses to promote students' conceptual learning of basic principles a ssociated with bivariate relationships. Maple's symbolic computation, graphic displays, and animation capabilities are used along with other classroom activities to study concepts related to (1) correlation coe fficients, scatterplots, and regression lines, (2) factors that affect the magnitude of sample correlations, (3) inferential tests, and (4) prediction error. For each of the 15 Maple procedures, students select population correlation values and examine the effects of different va lues on computer-generated graphical representations of scatterplots, regression lines, and sample correlations. The procedures are describe d and examples of exercises to support their use are provided.