DI-ing to Get it Done Pt. 2 (Destination Imagination Provincials)
Skiing in the arctic, falling through a tree well, an underground society, a spirit from the past, an old engraved vase, a finding that changed the world, ARE YOU GETTING DEJA-VU?! This was my Saturday afternoon yet again! However, this time the stakes were higher because we were presenting in the provincials tournament.
What is Destination Imagination
Destination Imagination (DI) is a global academic competition. Teams of all ages develop solutions to challenges and present them live at tournaments.
To learn more about DI and my challenge read my post I did about regionals here:
DESTINATION IMAGINATION REGIONALS
My Challenge
My Solution
“Luke! Didn’t take you all the way to the arctic just for you to sit and do your little science hobby! Be a real man and come skiing with me” This was the sentence that led to Luke’s great adventure.
A nerdy boy named Luke goes on a ski trip with his father who doesn’t accept his love for science. While skiing Luke falls through a tree well into a preserved underground city. While exploring, a beautifully engraved vase catches his eye and a spirt from the past floats out of it to tell him the rich history of the new world Luke has discovered. While trying to leave he hits his head and wakes up outside thinking it was all a dream until he sees the beautiful vase in his hand. Him and his scientist mentor research the vase using relative dating and they find out about the societies matriarchy and how they treated people of all genders equally. This new found information gave woman all over the world motivation that they can do something great, and taught Luke that he didn’t need his dads acceptance for him to feel complete because he has so many other people who fill that void.
What we Improved
Last month, we presented our solution at the regionals tournament, and after that, we acknowledged our FAILs and we made some changes for provincials. During regionals, we noticed that in our solution, there was some parts of it where you couldn’t tell where Luke was or what he was doing. We solved this problem by adding a tree that we created with a branch, held up with a Christmas tree holder, with a sign that said ‘caution tree well’. Also,
during regionals we had no way to stand up our puppet, so it was very hard to manoeuvre, we fixed this problem by adding straps to the back of the puppet so we could wear it like a backpack.
FAILs (First Attempts in Learning)
Nothing anybody ever does is perfect, and although provincials was our second more improved time presenting, there was still a few things that didn’t go so well. The stress of the competition got to my teammates and I, which caused a few of us to forget our lines. This occurrence was very disappointing in the moment, however, after watching the video back, it didn’t look sound like as big of a deal as I thought it was.
This taught me about perspective, the performance may have looked not very good in my eyes, but to people watching it, who don’t know the whole story, it looked fine.
What we Could Improve
If I were to do this project again, I would quadruple check that everybody, including me, knew our lines so well that we could do it in our sleep. We all did a very good job at memorizing our lines, yet we still messed up a few parts. I think that if we all were even more confident with our lines, when the stress got to us, saying them would be our reaction to the stress rather than forgetting them.
What Went Well
Although some of us forgot our lines, I think that our presentation went much better than regionals. We were much more confident which made the story so much more effective. Also, we were much more organized back stage, we all knew when and where to move the props around which made it look seamless.
What I Enjoyed
During this project I really enjoyed creating somthing I am proud of, showing it to the public, and winning somthing for all of my hard work. This project was so rewarding, and really fun once I had a good understanding of the assignment.
Strategies That Helped
How might we employ strategies to solve a challenge? This was the driving question I aimed to answer while doing DI. I learned so many and used so many strategies while doing DI, here are a few that really stood out.
Teamwork Strategies
Some strategies DI taught me that really helped with my teamwork was to communicate. At the beginning of the project we had a lot of problems with teamwork, after noticing these struggles we decided to have a team meeting about our teamwork. We started to give each other jobs, set strict rules and deadlines, and play off of each others strengths, and this help our group work immensely.
Acting Strategies
Another strategy that really helped me and my team out was to be super hyper and outgoing as possible when acting. This helps to make the presentation look a whole lot better and more dramatic.
Procrastinating Strategies
When doing any project it is very easy to procrastinate, and this is something my group and I struggled with a lot. A strategy that helped us get stuff done is assigning each other jobs that play off of our strengths, this helps us get stuff done quicker and have more fun while doing it.
What I Learned
Destination Imagination has come to an end, through this project I learned so much, I learned how to communicate with my group when I have an issue. I learned lots of different archeology terms and ways scientists study ancient artifacts. I learned lots of problem solving skills and critical thinking skills when I had to revise props and the script, and work through issues. I also learned a lot about acting, and much much more.
Thanks for following along on my Destination Imagination journey, to hear more perspectives on this project, visit my group members blogs: