We have a good start to our notebook so far and know some teams that have separate binders for different general categories like mechanical, programming, strategy, etc. Our team has a build/strategy, team, and coding notebook and our main reason of formatting it like this is because it would be more organized.
I had a few questions about doing this before we fully committed to it
Does anyone who has judged know if doing this is more organized?
Is it confusing to read through or easier to understand?
Hi @8330x, correct me if wrong but at tournaments your team typically submits one link to a file or one binder/notebook (I’ve never seen a team do multiple?). And to answer some of your questions:
I’ve never judged but I have reviewed notebooks and know some judges— it’s generally very uncommon and often less preferred
Imo it could mess up your EDP since the categories you listed al contribute to various steps of it
Creating multiple files or binders for each category could be hard to manage and less EDP-centered. Keep in mind also that (at least in past seasons) the rubric specifically mentions color-coding and other techniques to show EDP. Imo separating by categories wouldn’t be as appreciated, instead separating by design cycle or just adding tabs for each EDP step and cycle would be better.
Good luck and have fun! LMK if you have any questions
Chronological order is a main grading part in the notebook. If this is your first year, then do one notebook. But, if you know how to notebook well, you can pull it off, as long as you have a sheet at the beginning of the notebook that explains what you are doing.
A couple of years ago, some team done something very similar and won design at worlds, I suggest you look up notebook reveals to get a better understanding of what to do
I would not seperate coding into another section, however there is no problem with having different sections. Some things you could divide are EDP, detailed records, appendices (long tables, full code screenshot, things not necessary to EDP). I personally find sections to be one of the most important things for notebook organization, just not for code.
Thanks! This will be our 5th season so we just wanted it to be stronger and more organized than past years. I saw robokauz put their separate books into one collective binder, and my team talked about adding specific tabs when we reached another book. Maybe that would be better for judges and the EDP?
Yes. My team has been using tabs for the past 3 years. We have gotten several notebook awards, and went to worlds partially for it(got Excellence at state IQ) all with tabs, so I don’t think judges have a problem with it. Just make sure the tabs are chronologically ordered.
We’ve always had separate sections and they have tabs, I was just wondering if we were doing 2-3 different notebooks and organized them into one binder like robokauz, there would be a special way to indicate when you reached the next book https://youtu.be/onYs95UqlIs?si=ir04kSPtROIBo7ma
Chronological order is a main grading part in the notebook. If this is your first year, then do one notebook. But, if you know how to notebook well, you can pull it off, as long as you have a sheet at the beginning of the notebook that explains what you are doing.
A couple of years ago, some team done something very similar and won design at worlds, I suggest you look up notebook reveals to get a better understanding of what to do
My team did this for mix and match in iq and we won the excellence award 2 times since our notebook was good. I would definitely recommend if you already have experience notebooking for multiple years and want make your notebook longer.