Dominoes, cousins of playing cards, have been used for a variety of games since the 1300s. From professional domino competition to the simple joy of setting up and knocking over a line of dominoes, the tiles provide an endless source of entertainment and challenge.
Unlike the card games that are based on luck, domino is a game of strategy. When a player moves a domino into place, it triggers the fall of all others. The domino’s markings, called pips, originally represented the results of throwing two six-sided dice. They later became a means of adding and subtracting.
The most common domino sets contain a total of 28 tiles. However, there are also several “extended” sets that can increase the number of pips on an end from four to five, eight, or even 12 (though a set with all 12 is uncommon). These extended sets allow for more players to play and for more complex domino games.
When a person begins compensating for a weak foundational skill, it uses up the limited amount of working memory capacity that is available to process information. This limits learning and increases frustration.
In contrast, a strong skill can help overcome this obstacle and accelerate learning by freeing up working memory capacity for new information. When children’s compensation skills reach their limit, they will begin to have a negative impact on the strength of their core skills.
One of the keys to Domino’s early success was its emphasis on listening to employees. That tradition was continued by new CEO, Steve Doyle, who listened to employee feedback on things like the company’s dress code and training programs. He also put a focus on addressing complaints about the delivery service.
Similarly, when writers are constructing scenes that are out of character or don’t follow logically from previous scenes, they run the risk of creating a “domino effect” in which readers will find it difficult to continue following the storyline. The writer must give them enough logic and motivation to keep them engaged, such as the hero’s reason for doing something immoral or outside societal norms.
When Lily Hevesh creates her mind-blowing domino setups, she follows a version of the engineering-design process. She considers the theme or purpose of the installation, then brainstorms images and words that may be associated with it. She then creates a plan for the layout, noting how each piece will fit together and how they will move. She then tests the layout to see if it works. If not, she makes changes and tries again. This cycle continues until the domino is ready to be tested by a friend or family member. When the first domino falls, much of its potential energy converts to kinetic energy that is transmitted to the next domino and helps push it over. The process continues until the last domino falls.