No (d)ice

Maroon9

Photo Nov 15, 11 38 19 AM

By my count, that’s about how many new lessons we have left to teach this year,1 before we finish the regular portion of the course,2 after which the “real work”3 begins. 4

Currently, we’re teaching Type I/II errors and statistical power.

Bonus material from the early seasons, which won't even see that little light of day in the more current campaigns.
Bonus material from the early seasons, which won’t even see that little light of day in the more current campaigns.

Rather, we’re just barely5 scraping the surface of statistical power – a topic that we barely touch and hardly do justice.6

Last year at this time, we were on the verge of losing the 3rd of the three “ice” days.7 Oftentimes I think back with wonder about how we were able to make it through losing three A-days while barely skipping a beat.8

oh ice where art thou // now that we really want you // my haiku to ice.
My haiku to ice: oh ice where art thou // you are nowhere to be found // now that we want you.

And actually, now that I know that it’s possible to lose three class days and still make it through relatively unscathed, I’d been halfway hoping for some ice to come our way…

Sadly, no (d)ice.

  1. Only 8! But if you turn that “8” on its side, you get “infinity” — which, while technically not a number, is closer to what it’ll feel like, due in part to the numerous “fluff” days that are sprinkled into the calendar for the next couple of units. [↩]
  2. which I like to think of as the “regular season” [↩]
  3. AP Exam prep — the portion of the course that I think of as “the playoffs” [↩]
  4. If you’re curious about the 8 lessons: 2-prop z; 1-sample t; 2-sample t; matched pairs; chi-squared GOF; chi-squared 2-way; inference with slope. That’s seven, but at least one of them gets split over two days. I did say “about”… [↩]
  5. and oh, I do mean BARELY [↩]
  6. but given the complexity of the topic, possibly not a bad idea. [↩]
  7. Along with a half-day which proved to be wholly unnecessary… but was surely a politicized over-compensation for not deciding to cancel school for the 2nd ice day until after some kids had gotten to school. [↩]
  8. It was only possible due to the aforementioned “fluff” days… [↩]
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