Experimental Design B/C

[cconry]

Can your experiment be too simple? Even for B? Like what about: Do bigger potato weigh more. If you write it up correctly . . .

[Skink]

Can your experiment be too simple? Even for B? Like what about: Do bigger potato weigh more. If you write it up correctly . . .

They cannot be too simple so long as they fall in line with a few rules...
-testable, falsifiable hypothesis
-on topic (lest you be ranked below the others, effectively Tier 2'd)
-uses at least two of the supplies provided by the supervisor
-lends itself to statistical analysis

If you meet those requirements, you're good. I'd suspect supervisors generally have an idea what experiments you could possibly design (like how when writing a lesson plan they predict questions you will ask), so, odds are, they saw it coming.

[Bozongle]

Did well at Northridge Invitationals yesterday for Div B, 5th place. We got rushed for time as we were making the graph and rushed on the last few parts, we completely missed Qualitative Observations
I also made the big mistake of forgetting diagrams were part of the procedure, and as such we got points off for that.
I'm aiming higher for regionals.

[mnstrviola]

Can your experiment be too simple? Even for B? Like what about: Do bigger potato weigh more. If you write it up correctly . . .

yup, got tiered down for it once. My writeup would have placed, but the experiment was too simple.


Hmm, so for anyone who's gone to a regional recently, how was Experimental? What did they give you and what was the topic?

[Skink]

mnstr, that means you weren't on topic, whatever it was.

[mnstrviola]

Well they asked for a rate, and so I did "how does the height a ball is dropped from affect how long it bounces", which is a rate.
(Meters / Seconds)
Technically I was tiered down for "too little materials" which pretty much translates to an overly-simple experiment.

[Skink]

Ah, that makes sense. Sorry that happened to you. I would have figured you'd have been okay since a ball and (I assume) a meter stick are two materials, but, alas.

They cannot be too simple so long as they fall in line with a few rules...
-uses at least two of the supplies provided by the supervisor

I would question your experiment a bit if the supervisor gives you ten materials, and you only use two, even if it's technically legal.

[mnstrviola]

Lol, they gave us maybe ~50 and told us to use a rate (which any good experimental design experiment uses). The materials were toy cars, balls, chemicals, scales, and other random objects. With such an open objective I guess our experiment was a \bit\ disappointing

[Bozongle]

I can see where you come from, of the ideas I think of, the first I think of is dropping something, it's the easiest to experiment with .
For example at our Northridge Invite, We had gummy bears, 4 different spoons, 3 plastic cups, and rubber bands.
Our team decided to go with "How does the type of spoon/material of a spoon (one of the two) affect the distance the gummy bear will bounce?"
I know, pretty stupid/cheesy, but we had no idea what we could do with gummy bears without having too many variables/something too complicated.
We ended up placing 5th, but I believe it's because we got rushed and didn't fill out some parts enough. (We forgot about Qualitative Observations!)

[mnstrviola]

Ah yeah, I think event supervisors shouldn't pretty much force you to do an experiment (shooting gummi bears is the only thing I see there) though I would have gone with "how does the distance you stretch back a rubber band affect how far a gummi bear flies".

I'm not sure on how the spoons were, but I'm guessing they weren't really graph-friendly. By using something measureable like the distance you pull back a rubber band, the data is more quantitative and it's easier to collect your results. If the spoons were of varying sizes that might have worked, but if they were varying materials you'd have to order them using some kind of arbitrary measurement.