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I've yet to go to a tournament that has used anything as easy as k'nex or legos, I've only had stuff like pipecleaners, paper cups, beads, sequins, and push pins

Rebecca wrote:I've yet to go to a tournament that has used anything as easy as k'nex or legos, I've only had stuff like pipecleaners, paper cups, beads, sequins, and push pins

It depends a lot on both the level of the tournament and the state.

For instance, less well-organized competitions (i.e., Invitationals and most Regionals) have a tendency toward using 'random' (that is, non-building-toy) materials, partly because they think it's more creative and partly because it's easier for the people organizing the event to find a bunch of pipe cleaners, skewers, paper cups, etc. than to find a lot of the same Legos.

I've heard that Colorado's States also tend to have 'random' materials, and I know that last year NY States was 'random' as well- which was surprising, since there was a long trend in NY toward building toys, mostly Legos.

Nationals has been a particular building toy called Googolplex, of which there was extensive discussion in last year's WIDI thread (you can find it in the archives at the bottom of the board index if you want, although you'd have to dig through a lot of pointless/unrelated posts in that thread), for the past three years. This could be considered relatively easy- in that it's a pretty specific building toy, and there are limits to how many different ways it can be oriented- or quite difficult- in that nobody really has a lot of experience with it, since as a no-longer-produced "teachers' toy", it's impossible to find in order to practice with it.

Speaking of "random" building materials, what is the strangest Write It Do It strucuture you have ever worked with or heard of.

For example, years ago, for the South Carolina state competition the structure was made entirely of toothpicks and different sized marshmellows.

Phenylethylamine wrote:

Rebecca wrote:I've yet to go to a tournament that has used anything as easy as k'nex or legos, I've only had stuff like pipecleaners, paper cups, beads, sequins, and push pins

It depends a lot on both the level of the tournament and the state.

For instance, less well-organized competitions (i.e., Invitationals and most Regionals) have a tendency toward using 'random' (that is, non-building-toy) materials, partly because they think it's more creative and partly because it's easier for the people organizing the event to find a bunch of pipe cleaners, skewers, paper cups, etc. than to find a lot of the same Legos.

I've heard that Colorado's States also tend to have 'random' materials, and I know that last year NY States was 'random' as well- which was surprising, since there was a long trend in NY toward building toys, mostly Legos.

Nationals has been a particular building toy called Googolplex, of which there was extensive discussion in last year's WIDI thread (you can find it in the archives at the bottom of the board index if you want, although you'd have to dig through a lot of pointless/unrelated posts in that thread), for the past three years. This could be considered relatively easy- in that it's a pretty specific building toy, and there are limits to how many different ways it can be oriented- or quite difficult- in that nobody really has a lot of experience with it, since as a no-longer-produced "teachers' toy", it's impossible to find in order to practice with it.

About Colorado that you said is mostly true but last year at the invite they did us magnetix which cause my team to reconstruct the object perfectly and take gold.


Pratice wise i say no matter what you state has used in the past gather anything random that you can and use it to pratice. this can include raw spaghetti and flour and sugar which was regionals at colorado 3 years ago.

sweetcoop wrote:About Colorado that you said is mostly true but last year at the invite they did us magnetix which cause my team to reconstruct the object perfectly and take gold.


Pratice wise i say no matter what you state has used in the past gather anything random that you can and use it to pratice. this can include raw spaghetti and flour and sugar which was regionals at colorado 3 years ago.

That's interesting. I've never seen Magnetix used before, but I could definitely see it being on the easier end.

What kind of structure did they make out of spaghetti/flour/sugar? My Regionals had one made out of caramels, toothpicks, and packing peanuts three years ago, I remember, and two years ago was something really obnoxious with pipe cleaners, styrofoam, clothespins, I don't even remember what else, but it had some pieces that were only visible on half the models . This region has some problems with WIDI most years lol- usually it's with inconsistency in the models. I haven't done WIDI at Regionals since eighth grade (actually, haven't done it at all since then), but I've made a point of asking about it at every competition, since it's 'my' event.

Am I allowed to rename the connection parts of knex "spikes" without having to define them? There isn't really a set name for them that I know of...

jazzy009 wrote:Am I allowed to rename the connection parts of knex "spikes" without having to define them? There isn't really a set name for them that I know of...

You can name them anything you want without defining it (what would you define it as: "those bits that stick out on the sides"?), assuming it's not an abbreviation- in which case you would just define the abbreviation at first use (eg. "attach the third spike (sp) from the left...") and you're good. [I usually refer to the connecting pieces as "snowflakes"- yes, it's long and cumbersome to write, but it's a relic of several years of using it unthinkingly that now would take longer to change lol- and the individual connection spaces "slots", just btw.]

Phenylethylamine wrote: "those bits that stick out on the sides"?)

Haha yes that has pretty much been my main definition since I started this last year...I'm definitely more of a long distance writer as oppose to a sprint writer...that makes sense in my head.
I like spikes...though slot would also be easy...I can't believe I've never called them slots...oh well. Thanks.

*Edit* ok my definition isn't exactly like that but hopefully you understand...I think mine is more like "the attacher spot in the attachment piece"

I just love writing the word "attach"

jazzy009 wrote:

Phenylethylamine wrote: "those bits that stick out on the sides"?)

Haha yes that has pretty much been my main definition since I started this last year...I'm definitely more of a long distance writer as oppose to a sprint writer...that makes sense in my head.
I like spikes...though slot would also be easy...I can't believe I've never called them slots...oh well. Thanks.

*Edit* ok my definition isn't exactly like that but hopefully you understand...I think mine is more like "the attacher spot in the attachment piece"

I just love writing the word "attach"

Don't worry, makes sense to me too xD
Doesn't really matter what you call them, that just happens to be what occurred to me when I first started writing.
You don't have to define your terms at all as long as they're not abbreviations and not in any kind of code... i.e., as long as they're not intended to make it hard for someone other than your partner to figure out- although it's unclear to me why you'd want them to be. Could save you some time, even if you're not a sprint writer

Sprint writing? That's a new sport.

But I don't see what's bad about using abbreviations. If your partner already knows what they mean, it could save you a lot of time.