Engineering Notebooks...

These notebooks are used to demonstrate, on a periodic basis, what you do when you meet with your team to work on your bot. They’re for the judges, and they document your process and growth. This is really important and they have real nostalgic value later. They’re generally plain composition books (but it’s encouraged that you decorate) and entries should be made at each meeting.

Starting Your Engineering Notebook
1. Purchase a composition book or spiral bound notebook. These are better than three ring binders or portfolios because they’re easier to keep together without falling apart and sections being lost.
2. We strongly suggest that you decorate your book. It needs to incorporate the themes of your team, and your spirit. Ours is a pink-fronted composition book with our name emblazoned on the front cover in large, silver stickers and rhinestones. To give you an idea of how much your notebook will go through, ours has had sugar-free lemonade spilled across its pages; edges bent; been thrown around and generally loved.
3. An ‘About Us’ page is recommended, and short bios of team members are good too.
4. Everything you put in your notebook should be neat, organized and appropriate. Be aware that this is a tool for the judges. Keep it professional, but have fun. We’ve got smileys in ours.

Making Meeting Entries
1. You should make an entry every time you and your teammates gather to work on any aspect of the bot or PR (public relations can include fundraising, helping other teams, spreading the word of FIRST and getting other kids involved). You should make entries during meetings, so they’re as detailed as possible, as opposed to at the beginning (just what you plan to do) or the end (what you ended up getting done).
2. Try to keep up with the number of meetings you have. You should title each entry with the meeting number, and date all entries.
3. Start each entry by writing up a short, 3-4 sentence summary of your planned exploits, or goals. For example: “Today we want to improve our arm by re-working the gearing and replacing a servo motor. We are also designing a poster with a safety slogan to promote our image and encourage use of goggles in the pits. We’ll use this poster at our next competition.” If you want, you can write this in a list form, as opposed to a paragraph. Do whatever you feel comfortable with, but try to be concise, yet detailed and consistent. Keep your format the same.
4. After this, write in detail about the technical aspects of your work, and write how you’re feeling and what you’re thinking. Each of our entries is at least a full page, usually 2. Keep in mind we meet for more than three hours, at least once a week. When we have a competition coming up, we tend to meet twice for extra driving practice, so you’ll have plenty to write about.
5. Take pictures! Get ahold of a digital camera with USB hook-up and print pictures. Some of these should be ‘action’ shots of your teammates so you can show how you work, and also ‘cause you love them! Make sure the majority are ‘working’ pictures, but they can still be playful. Take lots. Use two or three. Pictures are extremely helpful when describing work you did on your bot--take before and after pictures, and draw arrows and make notes in margins.
6. Make diagrams! They should be detailed and noted, all of your bot, from different angles if you can. You can use your notebook to think out-loud: talk to your teammates and then draw your ideas. This is especially helpful in the early planning stages of the season. And it shows growth.
7. Everyone participates. Although we have a designated “journalist” on our team, everybody should take turns writing in the notebook. It’s more fun that way and it helps keep everybody involved.

Misc. Entries
1.Competitions and outreach experiences are important to include in your notebook as well.
2.Write about your feelings and thoughts before, during and after the event. Reflect. How were you received? Did you have fun? What were you there for? Did it help you? Did you help someone else? Are you glad you went? And anything else you feel like mentioning.
3.Try really hard to get something interesting to put in your book when you go, like a pamphlet, pictures or food wrappers (but make sure it has to do with robotics).