Using R to enhance numeracy in geography:

some pros and cons

Rich Harriswww.social-statistic.org

@socstatistics

Using R to enhance numeracy in geography: some pros and cons by Richard Harris / University of Bristol is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

From my office door

A society in which our lives and choices are enriched by an understanding of statistics– getstats.org.uk

A little idealistic but…

The Crisis of Numeracy

To unravel the complexities of society requires a highly skilled research base, equipped with suitable tools and techniques, most notably advanced quantitative methods […] Yet there are persistent concerns that the UK lacks the critical mass to satisfy such demand.

– ESRC document (2011)

How can R help?

Broadly intuitiveStrong focus on graphicsIt has in build good practiceIt’s free and cross-platform– http://cran.r-project.org/

Extendable and customisable– Libraries for mapping, spatial

statistics, spatial regression, geostatistics, etc.

Large user community

It’s not esoteric!

“R is used at the world’s largest technology companies (including Google, Microsoft and Facebook), the largest pharmaceutical companies (including Johnson & Johnson, Merck, and Pfizer), and at hundreds of other companies. It’s used in statistics classes at universities around the world and be statistical researchers to try new techniques and algorithms”– Adler (2010)

Example graphic made in R:Guardian league table rankings

by University

Reading data into R

Exploring the data

Pseudo-code &Simple descriptive statistics

Manipulating the data

Inferential statistics

Relational statistics

Mapping(this is where it gets interesting!)

Some pros

Command line– Faster, pedagogically superior (learning by

doing, no dumb button pushing!)

Keeps a clear log of what’s been tried– Which could be re-run as a script

Graphics are of publishable quality and easy to customiseInteractiveExtensive help documentationRealistic exposure to research level computing environment

Some cons

Risk of automated copying by scripts– I always create individualised data for

assessed project work

Pigeon English is hard for overseas students– There is native language support

Will often allow you to make errors!Isn’t a software package that will mean much to most employers– Though the skill of statistical computing

may be more credible

In general

“R is very good at plotting graphics, analyzing data, and fitting statistical models using data that fits in the computer’s memory. It’s not good at storing data in complicated structures, efficiently querying data, or working with data that doesn’t fit in the computer’s memory.”– Adler (2010)

Integration into the curriculum at Bristol School

of Geographical Sciences

Resources

Books & Manuals for R– http://cran.r-project.org/– Using R for Introductory Statistics (Verzani, 2004)– Statistics: An Introduction Using R (Crawley, 2005)– R in a Nutshell (Adler, 2009)– The UseR series

¿ http://www.springer.com/series/6991

Integration of R with Excel– http://www.statconn.com/

https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-sig-teaching¿ Special Interest Group (SIG) on teaching statistics with R.

One particular focus of the SIG is to provide helpful support to instructors new to R who are teaching introductory statistics courses populated with students with little experience in statistics, statistical software, and command line interfaces.

And of course…

Workshop tomorrow– 13.30 – 15.00

(Horton B)

Teaching material– www.social-

statistics.org– From late 2011

onwards