Activity: Research Speed Dating
This activity was described by Tony Tang, and is described below.
The activity has three goals:
- practice your elevator pitch;
- learn about what others are doing;
- get/give feedback on others' work.
The activity depends upon the amount of people present.
As a participant, this is what it's like:
- You sit across from someone else.
- You speak for 2 mins about your work
- Then you get feedback from the person across from you for 2 mins about your work.
- Then, the person across from you tells you about his/her work for 2 mins, and
- You provide 2 mins of feedback.
- Switch partners. Rinse, repeat.
If a dozen people are present, then each student gets to practice his/her pitch at least 11 times, and learns a lot about what others are doing. One of the other keys is that getting feedback from others in rapid form is awesome. This feedback comes in the form of both: "this is what was good/bad about the pitch; here are some suggestions on how to fix/adjust it", and also "you should read this paper; what about a variation on the idea by doing X?"