The Statistical Enquiry Cycle

We've been working hard over the last few weeks conducting our own statistical investigations, which yielded some very interesting results.

A statistical enquiry cycle that is used to carry out a statistical investigation. The cycle consists of five stages: Problem, Plan, Data, Analysis, Conclusion. The cycle is sometimes abbreviated to the PPDAC cycle.

The problem section is about formulating a statistical question, what data to collect, who to collect it from and why it is important.

The plan section is about how the data will be gathered.

The data section is about how the data is managed and organised.

The analysis section is about exploring and analysing the data, using a variety of data displays and numerical summaries, and reasoning with the data.

The conclusion section is about answering the question in the problem section and giving reasons based on the analysis section.

Our students produced posters that displayed their data using a number of different graphs and these results were analysed to produce conclusions and future questions and comments were made about the validity of their study.

Questions were asked of R6 students, and in one case, all the Y8's at Tahuna, around favourite sports, school values, eye colour, amount of sleep students get, favourite book genres, makeup of family structures etc.