A Tutorial Presentation of Statistical Procedures for Educational Experiments in Engineering Laboratories

This paper describes, in tutorial fashion, statistical procedures for educational experiments involving engineering laboratories. The sequence of the procedures is 1) formulation of the problem, 2) formulation of the hypotheses, 3) identification of the sample, 4) specification of the population, 5) construction of measuring items, 6) collecting data in cognitive and affective domains, 7) statistical analysis of the data, and 8) conclusions based on statistical analysis. This study was carried out at Michigan State University in an electrical engineering course (108 students). The statistical analysis was based on the outcome of four tests: pretest, posttest, retention test, and student attitude test.