Judging Tips for Elementary Projects 2012 Scott Ferguson, Ph.D. Atlantic Turf & Ornamental Consulting

Elementary Division  Divided into 3 Divisions:  K-3 rd  Class projects, usually 2 presenters/project  4 th Grade  5 th Grade  4 th graders compete with 4 th graders, 5 th with 5 th  No subject categories  Different Judge Forms for K-3 and 4 th & 5 th

Judging Areas K-3 rd 4 th & 5 th Scientific Method Subject Knowledge Verbal Presentation Backboard Display Data Treatment Backboard Display Data Treatment Supporting Documents

Scoring Strongly Disagree DisagreeAgreeStrongly Agree 0123

Scoring Strongly disagree DisagreeAgreeStrongly agree Total Does it tell the story of the project? Is it neat, legible, with no spelling or grammatical errors? Total 5 Backboard Display – 6 points

Scientific Method

 Is there a clear Problem Statement and Hypothesis?  Do the procedures help support or falsify the hypothesis?  Are there at least 3 replicates?  Was data collected?  Is there a clear conclusion and is it supported by the data?

Subject Knowledge  Do the students understand the project?  Did the students do the majority of the work?  Do they answer your questions effectively?  4 th & 5 th only: Has a research paper been written (often this is exactly what is on the display board – which is OK)

Verbal Presentation  Do the students speak clearly and refer to the display board?  4 th & 5 th only: can they effectively explain their research?

Backboard Display  Does it tell the story?  Is it neat, with no major grammatical or spelling errors?  Note: I have never deducted points for hand-drawn boards (versus computer generated)

Data Treatment  Are there graphs, tables and/or illustrations to show their data?  4 th & 5 th only: does the data presented on the board agree with the data in the Log?  Highly suggest using the metric system  Note: at the Elementary level we do not expect statistical analysis, other than an average.

Supporting Documents  4 th & 5 th grades only  Is there a Log that documents the project?  Does the data in the Log agree with the data on the board?  Note: Reprints are a plus

Final Points  Use simple terms  Encourage the students  Tell them that they did well  Encourage their future pursuit of science