tips and resources
thank you for your interest in coaching a team for the national science bowl® (nsb)! The NSB, like the other academic competitions its students compete in, is most rewarding for students when they spend some time preparing for the competition, and the NSB requires a lot of concentration to compete at the highest level. The strongest schools typically begin their annual practice sessions in the fall and have shown that careful preparation is key to achieving excellence at the National Science Bowl®. This webpage provides some guidelines to help you assemble and prepare a team for competition.
You are reading: Middle school science bowl preparation books
me. building a science bowl team
- hold weekly practices
- pick team(s) early
- pick enthusiastic students
ii. getting ready for science bowl
- practice with sample official questions
- learn from missed questions
- study science textbooks
- write questions
iii. study materials and resources
iv. invitational practice tournament
me. building a national science bowl® (nsb) team
The most successful teams in national science events (and academic competitions in general) often have an after school club dedicated to the activity. while some schools have over 50 students trying out for their schools nsb teams, any school can have a successful team as long as they can find four students who are excited about science and more importantly the bowl of science. schools use a variety of strategies to get students excited about nsb: we’ve heard from many nsb alumni that what initially got them excited about joining their school’s science team was attending a practice session and having the opportunity to answer some questions.
hold weekly practice sessions to attract enthusiastic students
many of the most successful schools host weekly open practice sessions in the fall so that anyone interested has a chance to play, while many 9th and 10th graders (6th grade for the nsb middle school) are not yet well equipped. To be on a competitive team, engendering a passion for NSB early on ensures your science team will have talented players for years to come. A good strategy for open practice sessions might be to read only the questions from the first eight rounds of the practice sets posted on the official National Science Bowl® website; these questions come from the early rounds in regional competitions and are generally less difficult than questions in later rounds. this can be a good way to get students interested in re-practicing week after week, after which they can start practicing harder questions.
For these open practices from the start, it’s okay to modify the format of the competition to maximize the amount of practice students receive*. For example, if the bell system you are using supports more than 8 players, it is better to allow more students to participate. all players should be encouraged to solve the bonus questions, and an alternative way to practice before teams are chosen is to simply treat the bonus questions as 20-second spins open to all. this way, all bonus questions are read, regardless of whether the answer was correct. if there are more interested students than available buzzers, be sure to rotate often so everyone gets a chance to play.
*one important exception: be sure to enforce the blur rule. students must be well trained not to let slip before competing.
choose competition teams early to allow time for focused practice and specialization
it is important to start organizing teams as early as possible: the start of the school year usually precedes the nsb regional competitions by only four to seven months. This may seem like a long time, but it can quickly disappear due to other student obligations. We suggest that coaches reduce the size of their competing team(s) by taking a Thanksgiving break so students have enough time to focus on practicing and studying in preparation for regional competition. ask your regional coordinator about the number of teams they will allow you to enter: some regionals allow 3 teams from the same school! this is a great way for more students to gain experience for future years, even if they aren’t on the “a team”.
Once teams are chosen, students should be encouraged to divide science disciplines and specialize. While it is ideal for each student to know the basics of each field, it is more realistic and less overwhelming for each person to gain a deep understanding of only one or two fields. a sample spec for a team of 4 might look like this:
- person 1: biology
- captain: math and physics
- person 2: chemistry
- person 3: earth and space science
It can often be convenient to have the mathematician as the team captain, as many additional questions involve lengthy calculations that do not allow the time needed to get the answer down the line.
Choose motivated students who have an intrinsic desire to compete in the science bowl
Regarding team selection, students often show differences both in interest in the science competition and in prior preparation, so it is important to select a team that not only has good scientific knowledge a priori, it is also made up of students who are passionate about science. bowling and stay motivated through scrimmages and study sessions. National Science Bowl, like the other academic competitions your students compete in, takes time and effort to excel, and it’s hard to achieve excellence if your students have their attention divided among too many activities. furthermore, the actual day of competition should be viewed as the culmination of a team’s preparation and practice rather than the focal point of the science bowl experience. therefore, it is a priority to choose students who have the interest and time to effectively prepare for the competition, so that the effort they put forth increases their knowledge and skills far beyond the initial differences between students. We also find that exposure to competition is one of the best predictors for future NSB success, so teaming up with highly prepared older students and promising young students ensures your team will have a good team not only this year, but also in the future. years. remember that each team must have four or five competitors and that teams cannot be mixed between regional and national competition if your team qualifies. additionally, it is recommended that coaches place 5 students on each team: if one student is unable to attend the national finals, the other four students will still be eligible to attend. teams of three students are not eligible to attend the national finals.
While team selection is ultimately up to the coach’s discretion, it may be more meritocratic to conduct “tryouts” where individual contributions are recorded. Remember that the performance of the roll should not be the only deciding factor, since answering the additional questions correctly is often more important for high scores. Although many schools use seniority as a factor in deciding who should be part of the “main team”, this can be detrimental to the success of the team. in fact, all things being equal, younger students can be more valuable additions to a competitive team, as they have the potential to grow even more in future years.
ii. preparing for the national science bowl®
There are several vectors along which you can focus your efforts to improve your science kit, each of which is important. Generally speaking, we recommend spending sessions in person by hosting practice competitions and allowing students to study on their own time.
In-person meetings should be practice sessions with sample official questions
It is extremely important that your teams become familiar with the rules and flow of the competition prior to the regional science championship. We recommend that the vast majority of in-person team meetings be devoted to scrimmages with a coach or one of the students acting as moderator. This isn’t just good competition prep, it’s the most fun part of getting ready for the science bowl! Through the NSB website, we have provided over 14,000 questions from previous competitions that your team can use to practice and prepare for the regional science competition (links for HS, MS). for reference, that’s enough rounds to read three rounds (approximately one hour of practice) in each weekly session for 14 weeks a year and have enough questions for eight years of teams.
Another key aspect of holding realistic practice sessions is purchasing a locking buzzer system. the national finals use the “10 player console buzzer system” produced by novel electronics (www.buzzersystems.com), but there are several other manufacturers that produce lockout buzzer systems (test systems, zee craft, quickpro systems, maybe) . We highly recommend practicing with a buzzer system to familiarize your students with the flow of the competition. If the cost is prohibitive, we still recommend regular practices, but acquiring a buzzer system is one of the best investments if you plan on introducing science kits for years to come. If your students can use laptops or smartphones, there are several quiz-style apps, such as Buzzin.Live and Trivia Bowl Live, that can be used to simulate a buzzer system. again, we suggest reading at least two or three rounds of official practice questions in each practice so that students become familiar with the flow of the competition and the content of the questions so that they develop an understanding of their strengths and weaknesses to guide their study .
Students should make a note of the questions they did not answer so they can investigate those topics
During practice sessions, your students are likely to hear several questions to which they don’t know the answer. Because science bowl questions tend to cover the same main topics year after year, it’s good practice for your students to make a note of questions they missed so they can look up those topics in their textbooks on their own time. . It’s no coincidence that NSB’s strongest teams have read thousands of practice questions during their practices; this serves to familiarize students with both the nature of the competition and the variety of topics we present in our questions. A good practice is for students to write their own practice questions on the topics they are investigating to help crystallize knowledge, as we will see below.
students should study from their science textbooks
National Science Quiz questions are generally drawn from science textbooks commonly used at the middle school through undergraduate levels. As a result, dedicated students can achieve a high degree of competitive success through careful reading of the textbooks provided by their science classes. As a general rule, the difficulty of the content at each proficiency level is predominantly as follows:
- middle school regional science bowl – science and algebra ii textbooks for grades six through eight
- middle school national science bowl – science and algebra ii textbooks Advanced High School Algebra II
- Regional High School Science Bowl: AP High School Science Textbooks
- National High School Science Bowl high school: introductory college level science textbooks
To better guide your study, we have included a list of sample textbooks at the end of this document.
students should write questions using their study materials
One of the main study strategies the perennial science bowl powerhouses use is to write science bowl questions from their study materials. Just as teaching some material is one of the best ways to crystallize knowledge of that material, writing practice questions as you study is one of the best ways to think about what kinds of questions can be asked about the material you just learned. Not only is this a good study technique, but it also ensures that the science club will have a backlog of extra practice questions for years to come. In addition, students should try to “get inside the head” of the question writers by mimicking the style and construction of the official National Science Bowl® questions to ensure that their questions are useful for their own learning and as practice tools for students. his teammates. . As your students practice with official sample questions, they’ll quickly become familiar with our question style, but here are a few general rules our writers follow:
- Short answer questions should always have one or two word answers with minimal space for interpretation.
- Questions should minimize excess verbiage to avoid confusion.
- Follow the conventions listed in the rules appendix.
- The best questions not only require recall of knowledge, but also involve applying that knowledge to arrive at the correct answer.
- The goal of writing questions is not to confuse students with esoteric facts, but to challenge them to study further and become familiar with the style of the competition.
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remember that science bowl is a journey, not just a destination
We believe that academic competitions and science bowls, in particular, are best thought of as a journey. Every extracurricular meet, practice round, and study session is an important part of what makes science bowling a worthwhile experience, and whether your team wins or loses, your students will have learned a great deal about science, discipline, and the benefits of bowling. deliberate practice. As such, it’s important to set realistic goals for how much time you and your team can spend at the science bowl and what results can be achieved with as much practice and study. While we have had instances of newly formed science teams winning their regional competition and, in one case, placing in the top three at the national science competition, in most cases, newly formed teams find that science they are a difficult but rewarding activity. It requires deliberate preparation. By setting challenging goals that will push your students forward and celebrating when they achieve them, we believe the National Science Bowl® will be an invaluable experience for you and your students!
iii. study materials and resources
This is a set of sample books that is not binding, but serves as a good place to start studying for the National Science Bowl®.
high school:
life sciences
-focus on life sciences, prentice hall
-sadava, life
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-glencoe biology, mcgraw-hill
-campbell, biology
-raven, biology
physical science
-physical science, mcgraw-hill
-hewitt, conceptual physical science
-giancoli, physics
-zumdahl, chemistry
mathematics
-algebra 1
-geometry
-algebra 2
earth and space sciences
-health earth sciences
-glencoe earth sciences
-seeds, fundamentals of astronomy
-tarbuck and lutgens, fundamentals of earth sciences
energy
-U.S. Department of Energy National Laboratory Websites
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high school:
biology
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-glencoe biology, mcgraw-hill
-campbell, biology
-raven, biology
-alberts, molecular biology of the cell
-costanzo, physiology
-crow, plant biology
chemistry
-zumdahl, chemistry
-klein, organic chemistry as a second language
physics
-giancoli, physics
-serway, faculty of physics
-young, university physicist
-mit opencourseware
mathematics
-precalculation
-single variable calculus
-probability and statistics
-multivariable calculus
-linear algebra
-differential equations
earth and space sciences
-seeds, fundamentals of astronomy
-tarbuck and lutgens, fundamentals of earth sciences
-garrison, oceanography
-grotzinger, understanding the earth
-tarbuck and lutgens, earth
-zeilick, introduction to astronomy and astrophysics
energy
-U.S. Department of Energy National Laboratory Websites
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