Experimental Design B/C

[eyeball138]

Creativity should not have to be involved in choosing an experiment. The writer of the test probably had something specific in mind, and that experiment will not involve creativity. It really doesn't make sense to be creative in Experimental Design. The rubric basically tells you what to write, and the choosing of an experiment should be done through common sense and intelligence. If you REALLY can't think of an experiment, I would honestly suggest looking around the room before being creative.

[zyzzyva980]

Being creative is not being able to come up with some whimsical thing such as analyzing how much ink a printer uses for different types of font (though that would be a fun experiment). Being creative means being resourceful and able to improvise.

And a dictionary definition:

cre·a·tive
   /kriˈeɪtɪv/
–adjective
1.
having the quality or power of creating.

Hopefully you will be able to create an experiment...

[eyeball138]

I really have no interest in monopolizing this thread with a long and pointless argument, so I'll just make one more recommendation: Do not get hung up on deciding what experiment to perform. As long as it clearly follows the specified topic, you should be fine. For B division especially, it is always quite clear what experiment should be done, although I'll see how clear it is at nationals this year. However, even at nationals last year (http://www.scioly.org/phpBB3/viewtopic. ... 716#p62716) it was pretty clear, given the topic and the materials, what experiment should be done.

IMO, deciding what experiment to do doesn't have too much impact on how you do, as long as it follows the topic, so just go with the first thing that you can think of, and move onto everything else in the event (because everything else gets you points while choosing an experiment to do does not).

[zyzzyva980]

I agree with most of what you said, my team finished top 3 mainly because we had experiments we knew we were going to do and we did them quickly, accurately, and had a very good write-up.

[bubblebrian]

What did you get in Ex. Design?
I got 4th place at state
I replaced some very incompetent people, who got 6th place at regionals
our compitition was about laser beams, and we got some filters with different patterns, and our object was to design an experiment using lasers

[zyzzyva980]

1st @ Regionals, 3rd @ States, though with two more minutes I'm certain we could have gotten first at state (giving us the points we needed to go to Nats...) This is a great example of how time management is crucial to the event.

[Phenylethylamine]

1st @ Regionals, 3rd @ States, though with two more minutes I'm certain we could have gotten first at state (giving us the points we needed to go to Nats...) This is a great example of how time management is crucial to the event.

Don't beat yourself up. The difference between first and third in an event is never the single reason behind an overall place, even if two points were all you needed.

[anecdote]I got DQ'ed in WIDI at States (stupid mistake), and I was all worried that those 56 points were the difference between first and second for us (we were 44 points behind the first place team). After a former coach of mine asked around, though, we found out that because WIDI was so close, even our almost-perfect score would've only been somewhere in the 13-15 place range if we hadn't gotten DQ'ed. So in the end it turned out the WIDI place, though making up a lot of those 44 points, wasn't actually the sole difference between getting first and getting second overall.[/anecdote]

But yes, you took the right lesson away from that. Time management is crucial to the event.

[Liv]

I posted some tips to do your best in Experimental Design on the wiki, which was then edited by hftf. However I advise along with that, to always make sure that things that you are not supposed to have are NO WHERE near you. (I got DQed at states and it wasn't even our rubric.)

[Phenylethylamine]

I posted some tips to do your best in Experimental Design on the wiki, which was then edited by hftf. However I advise along with that, to always make sure that things that you are not supposed to have are NO WHERE near you. (I got DQed at states and it wasn't even our rubric.)

Agreed.

For the sake of all things good and chocolaty, TURN OFF YOUR PHONES.

We've never had any issues with phones on our team, but I'm always worried that it'll happen someday.

[eyeball138]

We wound up getting 17th, which is fine, but I have to say that that test was not good. They gave us a jar of iodine and 5 snack foods, and we watched the snack foods change color. On paper this sounds ok, but it was not. They gave us peanuts as a snack food, and one person who had an allergy was forced to leave. I just don't understand how nuts could be used ever in this event,especially at nationals.