One topic that I heard throughout the conference was all about notebooking with students – both in the competition and in the classroom. Questions like these, and others, were brought up during 1-on-1’s, the happy hour, and in workshops:
- How do I get my students started with a notebook?
- Why do notebooks matter in competitions? Do we need them?
- How do I get my students to understand why notebooks are important?
- What is the best way to set up an engineering notebook?
In particular, there was one attendee I met with multiple times throughout the conference on engineering notebooks in regards to a competition. We worked through examples found online to narrow down on an idea of how to present notebooks to the students at the beginning of the next school year. One of the biggest tenets of this conversation was the importance of the engineering notebook as a way to communicate. Engineering notebooks allow students within the same group to communicate with each other. They allow students to communicate with judges at competitions. They allow students to communicate with you, the teacher, throughout their learning.
By setting the understanding of the notebook as a communication tool, you and your students can start to build a shared language for learning. The notebook becomes more than just a record of completed tasks, it becomes a meaningful space where thinking is made visible. When students use their notebooks to document, reflect, and explain, they begin to recognize the value of the process, not just the final result – this in turn allows students to buy in and understand why notebooks are valuable and meaningful.
What lessons did you learn from this past year on notebooks? What are you going to try in this upcoming school year/season?
Read other reflections from the 2025 VEX Robotics Educators Conference in this Insights article!
