Chapter 6

STATISTICS AND COMPUTER: TOOLS FOR

ANALYZING OF ASSESSMENT DATA

TOPICS

1. Descriptive and Inferential Statistics

2. Statistical Tools
3. Computer: Aid in Statistical Computing and Data Presentation

LEARNING OUTCOMES
At the end of the chapter, you should be able to:
1. Utilize data and results in reporting and interpreting Learners’
Performance.

Many teachers think that statistics requires advance mathematical skills and tedious
calculations. The elementary statistical concepts necessary in organization,
interpretation, analysis, and presentation for evaluation of grades and scores of
students is not what majority thinks of. At present, not only calculators are at hand to
facilitate computations, but most especially computers and some software which are
available for statistical computation and treatment.

TOPIC 1: DESCRIPTIVE AND INFERENTIAL STATISTICS

Statistic is concerned with the organization, analysis, and interpretation of test scores
and other numerical data. Statistical techniques help teachers to (1) analyze and
describe results of measurement obtained in their own classrooms, (2) understand the
statistic used in test manuals and research reports, and (3) interpret the various types
of derived scores used in assessment.

Statistical methods enable us to look at information from a small collection of people

or items and make inferences about a larger collection of people or items. Procedures
for analyzing data, together with rules of inference, are central topics in the study of
statistics. Brase & Brase (2012) define statistics as the study of how to collect, organize,
analyze, and interpret numerical information from data.
Descriptive Statistics

This is used to describe a group of individuals or describe the data that have been
collected; to describe variables that were grouped in order to determine the measure
of certain dependent variable that needs to be measured. Various data analysis
techniques provide meaningful description of scores with small number or numerical
indices. Such indices are calculated using samples drawn from a population and are
called statistics. On the other hand, when indices are calculated using the entire
population, it’s called parameters. This type of statistics is used for summarizing and
describing data sets.

Inferential Statistics

When there is a need to make a decision, estimate predictions, or generalized about

population based on a sample, then inferential statistics will be utilized. There are two
types of tests in inferential statistics. These types are: (a) Parametric; and (b)Non-
parametric.

In parametric test, a test of significance is used if the data represent an interval of ratio
scale of measurement and other assumptions have been met. On the other hand, non-
parametric test is used when data represent an ordinal or nominal scale, when a
parametric assumption has been greatly violated, or when the nature of the
distribution is not known.

TOPIC 2: STATISTICAL TOOLS

To carry out meaningful comparisons among sets of tests scores, a statistical tools is
needed. Measures of central tendency and measures of variability are the most
commonly used statistical tools.
Measures of Central Tendency

Measures of Characteristics
Central Tendency
The Mean • Most frequently used index of distributions central
tendency.
• It is simple an arithmetic average of all the scores in
the distribution
• Since it is computed using every score in the
distribution, it is an extremely representative
measure.
• Its strength is also its weakness because several
atypically high or atypically low scores (sometimes
called liars) can distort the value of the mean.
The Median • The second most frequently used index of central
tendency.
 • It is the point that divides the score into two equal
halves
• One advantage of median as a measure of central
tendency is that it is not unduly affected by peculiarly
large or small scores.
• As the mean, the median’s strength is also weakness,
the median fails to reflect the magnitude of the impact
of every score in the distribution, even when certain
of those scores are very high or very low.
The Mode • It is the most frequently occurring score in the
distribution.
• With most reasonably larges set of scores, the mode
will occur somewhere near the middle of the
distribution, so it can also serve as an index of the
distribution’s central tendency.
• In some cases, a distribution has two or even three
most frequently occurring scores. In such cases,
statistician refer to it as bimodal or trimodal
distribution. Multimodal distribution refers to those
with three or more frequently occurring scores.
• Since the mode takes into account even fewer data
than the median, and fewer than the mean, it is not
used often in describing a distributions central
tendency.

In a normally distributed set of scores, the mean, the median, and the mode are
identical. Imagine a bell-shaped symmetrical curve, the value of all these indicators will
coincide.

Oftentimes, if this is the case, only one of these indicators is used to describe how the
distributions scores tend to center. In such cases, that indicator is usually the mean.
When there is great difference between the numerical values of the mean the median,
it is a good idea to describe the distributions central tendency by providing both the
media and the mean, better yet the mode as well (Popham, 2000).

Measures of Variability

Aside from describing how a set of scores tends to the center of distribution, the
information about how variables the score are, is also important. It is also relevant to
know how spread out the scores are.

Measures of Characteristics
Variability
The Range • Most readily calculated index of distribution’s
variability
 • It is calculated by subtracting the lowest score from
the highest score.
• The simplicity of the range’s computation is just the
only redeeming virtue, because there are only two
scores involved in its computation. If there is an
abnormally highest and/ or lowest score, the
resulting range will yield a misleading indication of
the distribution’s overall variability.
The Quartile • It is based on the range of the middle 50% of the
Deviation scores, instead of the range of the entire set.
• It is also called semi-interquartile range.
• Quartiles are points on the scale (like averages and
percentiles,) the quartile deviation represents a
distance on the scale. It indicates the distance that is
necessary to go above and below the median to
include approximately the middle 50% of the scores.
The Standard • It offers a way of thinking about the average
Deviation variability of a set of scores when they compute the
mean.
• It tells the average distance from the mean for each
of the scores in the distribution
• The more spread out the scores are, the larger the
value of the standard deviation. The less spread out
the scores, the smaller the standard deviation is.
• The most useful measure of variability
• Because it takes into account the amount that each
score deviates from the mean, it is a more stable
measure of variability than the others.

In summary, the quartile deviation is used with median and is reasonable for
analyzing small number of scores. These statistics are obtained by counting and thus
are not affected by the value of each score; they are especially useful when one or
more scores deviate markedly from the others in the set of scores. O the hand, the
standard deviation is used with the mean. It is a most reliable measure of variability,
and is especially useful in testing. Also, it is useful in describing the set of scores in a
group, its serves as basis for computing standard scores, the standard error of
measurement, and other statistics used in analyzing and interpreting scores.

Standard Scores

Aside from the Measures of Central Tendency and Measures of Variability, another
group of standard scores that may be used in assessment are discussed in the following
table.
 Standard Score Characteristics
Z-score • The simplest of the standard scores, and the one on
which others are based.
• It express test performance simply and directly as the
number of standard deviation units a raw score is above
or below the mean
• A z-score is always negative when the raw score is
smaller than the mean. Thus z-score is seldom used
directly in test norms, but are transformed into a
standard score system that uses only positive numbers.
T-score • It was originally given to a type of normalized score
based on a group of unselected twelve-year-old children.
• It refers to any set of normally distributed standard
scores that has a mean of 50 and a standard deviation of
10.
• T-score is obtained by multiplying the z-score by 10 and
adding the product to 50. This formula is true only when
the original distribution of raw scores is normal.
• The reason that T-scores is preferred to z-scores for
reporting test results is that only positive integers are
produced.
The Stanines o These are simple type of normalized standard
score that illustrates the process of
normalization.
o They are a single digit scores ranging from 1 to 9
o It is named as such because the distribution f raw
score is divided into nine parts wherein stanine 5
is precisely the center of the distribution and
includes all cases within one-fourth of a standard
deviation on either side of the mean.
o Major strengths of stanines are the following:
o The stanine system uses a nine-point scale in
which 9 is high, 1 is low and 5 is average
o Stanines are normalized standard scores that
make it possible to compare student’s
performance on various assessments
o It makes easy to combine different types of data
because it is computed as percentile ranks but
are expressed in standard score form.
o It uses a single-digit score, it is easily recorded
and takes up less space than scores.
The Percentile • Indicates student’s relative position in a group in terms
Rank of the percentage of students’ scoring lower (Linn &
Gronlund, 2000)
• One of the most widely used and easily understood
methods of describing assessment performance
 In summary, standard scores provide a students’ relative position in a group
terms of standard deviation units above or below the mean. In a normally distributed
set of score the different standard score scale and the percentile scale are interrelated,
thus making of possible to convert from one to another. One of the short comings of
standard scores is that students and parents it find difficult to understand. Another
limitation is that, interpretations is difficult unless the scores are evenly distributed.

Indicators of Relationship

There are techniques of describing the relationship of the scores in different subject
areas. These are: (1) Graphic Presentation; (2) The Product-Moment Correlations
Coefficient; and (3) The Rank-Order Correlation Coefficient.

I. Graphic Representation

By using graphic display techniques, the relationship between two variables can be
described according to its magnitude (strong and weak) and its direction (positive or
negative). This technique though shows that it is difficult to get a firm grasp or
graphically displayed relationship because of the imprecision of visually derived
estimates.

II. The Product-Moment Correlation

This is most widely used indicator or the magnitude and direction of the relationship
between two variables, the product-moment correlation coefficient popularly known
as Pearson correlation coefficient named after the English statistician Karl Pearson.

This product-moment correlation coefficient ranges from +1.00 to -1.00. Of + 1.00

represents a perfect positive relationship while a value of -1.00 represents to perfect
negative relationship. An r of zero indicates that there is no linear relationship that exist
between two variables. This correlation approach is used with linearly related data,
meaning, data whose scatterplots shows a more or less straight-line relationship.

III. The Rank-Order Correlation Coefficient

The Rank Correlation Coefficient is another technique for estimating the magnitude
and direction of the relationship between two variables. This technique was introduced
by Sir Charles Spearman. Spearman’s correlation coefficient (rs) is interpreted in
essentially the same way as Pearson product moment rm but simpler to compute.
Aside from its computational simplicity, it may be used with data that represent only
an ordinal scale and not necessarily an interval.

Recall that there are different measurement scales that are normally used in education,
most especially by educators involved in assessment activities. These scales are interval
scales, ratio scale, and ordinal scale. An interval scale is one that allows you to believe
that there are equal intervals that are equidistant points on the scale. A ratio scale, is
an interval scale for which a zero point exits. An ordinal scale is based on rank.

TOPIC 3: COMPUTER: AID IN STATISTICAL COMPUTING AND DATA

PRESENTATION

In the previous paragraphs of this chapter, fundamental concepts of statistics and

statistical tools used for different statistical methods were discussed. In the succeeding
paragraph, simple computations of statistical treatment will be discussed with
emphasis on the use of computer and the software MS Excel, a software developed by
Microsoft, to make computation more efficient and less prone to error.

Basic Steps in Opening the MS Excel Program

1. Click the icon of MS excel or if not available, click start button to choose all
programs and double click on MS Excel to open the program. This is the initial
window that will appear and if you’re using the latest version of MS Excel, simply
click on blank document option. If you have a previously created file to work on,
then simply double click Open other worksheets.
2. Once a worksheet has been opened, it is now ready for data entry. You may now
encode the scores (data) that will be processed. The worksheet is like this:

Now we may start encoding our data. We start our discussion with Charts and
Frequency Distribution.

Charts and Frequency Distribution

The table below contains the grades of 10 students in their Mathematics and English
subjects. The first column is the student class number, second column is the Math
grade and the third column is the English grade.
Using the encoded data, it may be converted into charts and/ or diagrams.

A scatter diagram was created by using the insert chart function of MS Excel. Detailed
steps on how to have scatter diagrams are as follows:

1. Click the Insert Tab, then among the chart options, choose insert Scatter.

Note that types of chart may be chosen based on preference of the user on how they
would want to present their data. Bar graphs, pie charts, line graphs, etc. are just some
of the charts available and can be utilized.

Computing for the Measures of Central Tendency, Variability and Correlation

Statistical functions are available in MS Excel. Click the FORMULAS tab and the different
available formulae logically organized will be displayed. Choose the more functions
icon, then choose Statistical. Several statistical formulate are provided on the list. For
the Mean, function average will be used.
For example: For the Mean, choose AVERAGE from the list, once you click the function
average, the following screen will be displayed.

Fill-in the required fields to indicate which among the encoded data will be considered
in the computation of the mean, press ok, and automatically the mean will be
computed and placed on the space where you indicated to place the result, for this
case, the ones enclosed with rounded edge box.

Similar steps shall be followed for other statistical formulate, such as Standard
Deviation (STDEV), Median (MEDIAN), Mode (MODE), Range (RANGE), Pearson
(PEARSON), z-test (ZTEST) same user interface is displayed so it is easier for the user to
encode the necessary information such as the raw data that will be included in
processing/computation, Not all may be available in MS Excel, nevertheless majority of
those statistical computations are.

In the older version of MS Excel, the statistical formulae are not available. Instead, most
of the formulae are packaged all together and displayed into a single table containing
the computed values. This is packaged under Descriptive Statistics function Statistics
Summary. The information contained in the “packaged function” consist of the
following: Mean, Median, Mode, Standard Deviation, Sample Variance, Kurtosis,
Skewness Range, Minimun, Maximum, Sum and Count.

Another software that was really designed to support statistical computations is the
SPS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences), which has evolved into Statistical Product
and Service Solution. All the Statistical formulae are available in this software.