The practice of statistics for STEM: Primary students and pre-service primary teachers exploring variation in seed dispersal

STEM education is becoming more common in schools and provides a rangeof exciting real-world contexts in which students can engage. However, a gapin most approaches to STEM remains the collection and use of data that canbe used concurrently to develop statistical literacy and science literacy. Thispaper describes a STEM activity carried out with Year 5 students. The contextoriginated in science and asked students to collect data to find the answer to aquestion, then present and interpret their data using TinkerPlots software.Elements of the same activity were also carried out by 4th-year Bachelor ofEducation (primary) pre-service teachers (PSTs) as part of a unit in scienceeducation. The activity provided the opportunity for the PSTs to experience anauthentic STEM activity that had been conducted with primary students.