Illustration of probability distribution concepts using a graphics software package

Courses in probability and statistics are taken each year by thousands of students across the country in disciplines such as business, life sciences, humanities, education, agriculture, and the social sciences. Often the students in these courses have experienced lack of success in their provious encounters with mathematics and thus many students bring a negative attitude into the probability and statistics courses. This resistant atmosphere is especially noticeable to the teacher when he or she informs the students about the required mathematical exercises and/or tedious numerical computations in the new course content.