Fermi Questions

-Fermi is a test of BSing, but you need to take it seriously when preparing. You must set yourself apart as a bser, and my personal belief is that there is a more efficient way of preparing than simply memorizing random facts. Training for efficiency in estimation and training your brain to be ok with "i'm not sure this is right but f**** it" is important, and experience will carry you through this event.

-We made a list of numbers you should know for this test. It was quite helpful...it should be in the fermi file folder but if not ask old people who did fermi

-'''TAKE PRACTICE TESTS. LOTS. IT'S PAINFUL BUT YOU MUST.'''

Things to Know (Test Content):

-All conversions--length, time, volume, acres, etc...This is extremely important. At nationals, everyone will be able to BS sufficiently so accuracy will come down to how well you know your obscure conversions. Knowing a conversion like AU to lightyears will leave less room for mistakes in estimation than knowing lightyears to km to AU.

-Population of cities, area of cities / US / land area of world, world population --> know MA facts for states

-Some facts are straight memorization, you'll gain knowledge of these through experience (many practice tests will contain a few of these apiece): number of hairs on human head = 10^5

-mass of Earth, sun, moon, diameters, lightyear, AU, etc...a base in astronomy knowledge goes a long way.

-any formulas/constants covered in your high school science courses, including speed of light and Avogrado's #

-Everest, Mariana Trench,other notable landmarks in the world.

-EM spectrum: Comes up surprisingly often.

-some basic physics formulas show up a lot....force, gravitation, escape speed....the 2013 national test was pretty much 25% gravitation.

-ANYTHING RANDOM

Things to Know (Testing Skill):

SPLIT THE TEST: Unless you and your partner are extremely prepared and confident in your ability to work together and still finish the whole test, SPLIT IT. For a test like Fermi, chances are your guess is as good as your partner's, so if you have a vague idea of what to do DO IT.

-Confidence: The fact that you've been assigned this event means you can BS. So do BS and believe in the power of your own BS.

-Small numbers don't matter: Remember this is power of 10 only. So don't waste time thinking about whether it's 1/3 or 1/2 of the world's population, for example-it most probably won't make a difference. As long as it's in the same expoential range, just pick one and move on.

-Keep moving forward: I can guarantee that there will be questions where you read what you're being asked and tears start rolling down your cheeks. Show your partner quickly, ask if he/she has a general idea of how to do the problem. If yes, let them do/guess the question while you work on a problem from their half of the test.

-Get an answer down: If no, think about it for like 5 seconds, and guess REASONABLY. Don't simply throw away the question or skip it. Since answers are in powers of 10, getting 1 or 2 powers off is better than leaving it blank or making a guess without some thought. MOVE ON. QUICKLY.

-Rounding rules: These can REALLY come in handy. If you know the answer is somewhere between 10,000 and 100,000, try to reason out whether it's between 10,000 and 50,000 or 50,000 and 100,000. That's really all that matters and allows for efficient bsing. Don't get hung up on small calculations. Big picture is what counts, and rounding properly is the different between full/partial or partial/no credit.

-Time Management: In terms of state tests, Fermi is actually one of the less time constrained ones. Work efficiently but keep your head clear, don't let one especially troublesome question (and there will be one or more) hold you up or cloud your mind. If you're having a ton of trouble with a question, it's generally not worth it to spend too much time. BS and MOVE MOVE MOVE.

2013 State test: They basically asked 5 questions each in the categories length, time, counts, mass, volume etc...As long as you know your memorized facts, there is nothing really challenging

2013 National Test: Ok, we were really dumb. The first 5 questions we had no idea what was going on so we skipped them for later. Then we realized that the guy provided the basic numbers you need at the top of the page, so you could do them. Would have save some time if we had just noticed that at first instead of spending some time trying to solve them and then deciding to skip. So, READ THE TOP OF THE PAGE FIRST. it might help you ;) Also, there was a lot on gravitation and populations..