Science olympiad club?

[gsjbjt]

Hey, I was just wondering what yall do in terms of motivating your team to study and do well.
Do you guys hold instructional meetings to guide individual events, or you just leave everyone to do their own thing once events are assigned?
We're a relatively new team and last year we had the problem that people procrastinated until the week before competition day or simply did no studying at all...

[mnstrviola]

Hey, I was just wondering what yall do in terms of motivating your team to study and do well.
Do you guys hold instructional meetings to guide individual events, or you just leave everyone to do their own thing once events are assigned?
We're a relatively new team and last year we had the problem that people procrastinated until the week before competition day or simply did no studying at all...

I assume having a Science Olympiad class is out of the question, but some schools do that.

@ my old school we had meetings every Friday after school, where you can talk w/ ur partner or watch the Bottle Rocket kids... it was really laid back and fun Around Decemberish the coach would meet with everyone and check our progress.

Try to get your experienced members talking with the new recruits, it helps build teamwork and also can get some of their questions answered. Show them the Wiki too, it's helpful for understand what exactly their event is about.

[aim4me26]

Last year, we usually had weekly meetings on Fridays, where the whole team came and discussed stuff.

At those meetings, or whenever we would see each other, we discussed times and dates with our partners. We met up/studied/practiced during the days that we had decided upon previously. It worked out really well, and made Science Olympiad fun at the same time.

[Skink]

Two points:
B and C are very different beasts, so what works for us probably wouldn't work for you (scheduling being the concern).
There is no single 'right' way to practice for events. I've seen successful teams structured using most conceivable methods. Motivation and dedication are the two things you need independent of how you practice.

I believe motivation comes from three sources, mostly the first two: past success, bribery, and drive.
If a team has past success, they will likely compete to maintain it. Other teams may compete against this, too, especially if they tend to rank in the top single digits at State. By bribery, I usually mean food. Food is a motivator for whatever you're doing, really. Pizza is the obvious choice, possibly candy or chips. If your team has a budget that is not overseen, you could theoretically go through a lot of pizza. Personal drive of individual teammates can carry the team far even if there are several crammers. Granted, a team's long-term success shouldn't be left in the hands of a few dedicated individuals. SO is a team sport, and you know the saying. There is no 'I' in 'team'. Remember that this site probably has a disproportionate amount of the driven crowd.

That said, my personal suggestion to avoiding your team becoming more of a social club than a competitive team is to set goals. Deadlines. Milestones. Whatever. Have target events for every team meeting (if those act as your practices), and you may want to shoot for covering, on your own and at practice, section 3a-e, for example, in n number of weeks. If you fall behind, modify the schedule. Having nothing to follow tends to mean nothing gets done. It's not a cure-all, but it's better than closing your eyes, spinning, and throwing a dart hoping it lands on the target.

EDIT: Oh, I neglected to mention that, as a new team, you may want to focus on some, not all, events and try to do well in a few as you build your program up. Unles you have experienced AND dedicated coaches AND teammates, you're not likely to become highly successful in a year, though IL does have an example of this.

[tuftedtitmouse12]

Like Skink said, Division B and C are very different, both in competition level, but also in the time you have. High school is pretty busy, so I think the best approach would be for each person, once you have events and scheduling conflicts sorted out, to work on their own, and come together with their partners during the team meetings, if that's your practices, to figure out who's doing what.

That's good for study events, but lab events and builds you'll probably need to have each event stay afterschool about an hour once a week, at the very least, to meet and build/do the lab, outside of the team meetings. Motivation; past success does help, but if not, just compete the best you can at states, and if you do well enough, it'll push the team to do better next year. Good luck to you and your team!

[silverheart7]

I don't know how other schools work, but Gelinas has a few interesting ways.

First off, we start the year off normally with 65 kids, or five regional teams. This year we have like 105, which is a little crazy.

Secondly, up til regionals, we hold scheduled meetings every day. Several events can practice on the same day/time. We have several coaches and many student mentors teaching groups of newer or less experienced kids.

After regionals, we pick from the five teams and create the varsity team, which is our states and nationals team.

From there, schuduled event practice sort of dissolves. We have practice almost every day, and everyone just meets with their partner or the coach and works together.

It's different but basically, we have schduled and taught event practice until regionals. From there, we just sort of trust that everyone is working on their events, because the kids left are usually the dedicated ones.

FOOD IS A GOOD INCENTIVE