Keywords: education, R, Shiny, RStudio, introductory statistics, undergraduate education
Undergraduate students from a wide variety of majors are often required to take an introductory statistics course. Educators in charge of these courses face the unique challenge of incorporating modern tools, sometimes including programming languages like R, in classes designed for students with non-technical background. In this talk, I will present and demo a new set of tools for bridging the gap between code and concept. These tools, built in Shiny, give students a hands-on, guided coding experience which emphasizes data analysis principles over specific R syntax. I will also share my general experiences, tips, and takeaways for using R in introductory courses, based in part on polling data from recent classes.