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 Prob Sim® was a Macintosh Classic application with accompanying instructional activities designed for teaching probability via simulations in grades 6-13. To model a probabilistic situation:

• a "mixer" is constructed containing the elementary events of interest
• the mixer is sampled from after specifying replacement options, sample size, and number of repetitions
• events of interest in a sample are specified and counted
• specified events are counted in new random samples.

The software makes this last step especially easy. Once analyses have been conducted on one sample, the user has only to press a button to see the results of the same analyses performed on a new random sample. This feature promotes the recognition and quantification of variability among results in successive random samples. Additional features include highlighting outcomes of interest, reshaping data, and sampling until a specified event occurs.

The following articles and reviews provide additional information about using Prob Sim. See also the Chance Plus Project.

Articles

Konold, C. (1995). Confessions of a coin flipper and would-be instructor. The American Statistician, 49, 203-209.

Konold, C. (1995). Datenanalyse mit einfachen, didaktisch gestalteten Softwarewerkzeugen für Schülerinnen und Schüler. Computer und Unterricht, 17, 42-49. (English version: "Designing data analysis tools for students.")

Konold, C. (1995). Issues in assessing conceptual understanding in probability and statistics. Journal of Statistics Education, 3(1). (http://www.amstat.org/publications/jse/v3n1/konold.html)

Konold, C. (1994). Teaching probability through modeling real problems. Mathematics Teacher, 87, 232-235.

Reviews

Ernie, K. (1996). Technology reviews: DataScope and Prob Sim. Mathematics Teacher, 89, 359-360.

Garfield, J. (1995). Software review: DataScope and Prob Sim. The Statistics Teacher Network, Winter , p. 7.

Prob Sim can still be used on Macintosh computers from the 1992-2007 era (download).