| Technology is making an incredible impact in education. As an educator it is difficult to determine which technological tools would most enhance the teaching of a statistics course. The educator must consider economic issues, time restraints, statistical procedures and most importantly the promotion of student exploration and inference of statistical concepts.;It was concluded that the optimal learning environment for an introductory statistics course is one in which Fathom software and the graphing calculator are utilized. It was also recommended, that a major single-user statistical package such as SPSS or SAS be purchased for the teacher so that students can be exposed to interpreting statistical results from such packages.;The purpose of this study was to explore the process of learning statistics using the graphing calculator and/or Fathom software. The tools were being considered for utilization in both high school and college introductory statistic courses, as well as Advanced Placement statistic courses. A comparison of the two tools, using the twenty-six topics included in the book Workshop Statistics: Discovery with Data and The Graphing Calculator (Rossman and Von Oehsen, 1997), and the topics relevant to the advanced placement exam was executed. Also, a comparison of economic issues, as well as availability of texts and resources for each tool was completed. |
