Experimental Design B/C

[ninjapenguin]

Hey guys! I'm back from the invitationals with another second place ribbon (still going for that first!!), and I"m getting ready for regionals.....alone. Any extra help on what regionals is like?

[SWAnG]

Regionals is generally easier than invitationals so you should be fine! (unless the team that beat you is in your region :O). But you should seriously consider a partner, I'm surprised you can even get that much written down O_O

[misterstealyogirl]

Is it possible it could be based on the type of experiment done as well? Like maybe you HAVE to use bar graph, or should've used line graph

I guess, I don't think I have ever had to use a bar graph in this event. I think it's better to chose an experiment where you have to use a line graph because you can do linear regression as a statistic.

Maybe it's by how practically applicable your experiment is or how creative it is (different from all of the other team's experiment)?

[Skink]

I've always wondered this: Eventually (usually at state and national level) everyone gets EVERYTHING on the rubric, but somehow they are able to people in such a wide range of places. How is this possible? I personally have done ExDes for the last 2 years and regardless of how perfect our lab write up was, we would never be able to get medals at state .

Good question. I have wondered this myself. Even at only moderately competitive Regional tournaments, already all teams score highly. To that end, I suspect that the higher level tournaments go for most sophisticated topics to try and spread out the scores. Furthermore, it's possible lower level supervisors are...laxer...on the scoring. For example, most teams aren't good with standard of comparison, but I'd bet they get a pass sometimes! And, of course, there are tiebreaker provisions in the rules.

EDIT: Oh yeah, something I didn't add that I should is that tournaments can't have ties for any reason. So, I'm sure there have been situations somewhere in events like this that can be high-scoring where folks just have to...break the tie(s) by any means possible.

[Crazy Puny Man]

tournaments can't have ties for any reason

Wasn't there a tie for 4th place in Food Science (B) at nationals last year?

[Skink]

There was. I can't explain that one.

[finagle29]

What's the most difficult set of materials and topic you've had to design an experiment around? My Experiment team is trying to reduce the time it takes us to plan what experiment we're going to do by placing ourselves in worst-case scenarios.

[ninjapenguin]

What's the most difficult set of materials and topic you've had to design an experiment around? My Experiment team is trying to reduce the time it takes us to plan what experiment we're going to do by placing ourselves in worst-case scenarios.

Well, I guess this isn't that hard, but to me, it seemed near impossible. (Still got second, luckily).
The items given were various types of string and threads, two popsicle sticks with notches in them, one stick (of what appeared to be bass wood), and some cups.
The topic was "tensile strength", which wouldn't have been hard except for the fact that there was no way to measure ANYTHING (not pounds, grams, or even newtons!). There was no scientific way to test this.
So, I accepted the fact and got some points marked off for this, but still finished 100/120. (Of course, petty mistakes were made)

[solakmagic]

What is the correct way to list materials? Should only a list of used materials be written, only a list of all materials, or two separate lists? Thanks.

[Phys1cs]

What is the correct way to list materials? Should only a list of used materials be written, only a list of all materials, or two separate lists? Thanks.

Your list of materials should only have what you're using, and how many. If you're given three tennis balls, one plastic cup, one glass cup, and twenty rubber bands (goodness knows what type of lab you could do from these materials), and you use two tennis balls, the glass cup, and ten rubber bands, your materials should look something like:

1 Glass Cup
2 Tennis Balls
10 Rubber bands (if theyre different sizes, seperate them and list the number of sizes. (3 Thick Rubber bands, 7 Thin rubber bands))