Secondary and Primary Tournament of Minds

Tournament of Minds (TOM) is a problem-solving program for teams of students from both primary and secondary years. Tournament of Minds aims to enhance the potential of young people by developing diverse skills, enterprise, time management, and the discipline to work collaboratively within a challenging and competitive environment. Congratulations to both our Secondary and Primary teams who represented SCEGGS.  Below are their reflections.

Secondary

On Sunday 8 September six teams from SCEGGS Darlinghurst competed in the Secondary Division at Randwick Boys High School. Their presentations were the culmination of six weeks of positive teamwork, creativity and ingenuity.  This year, the Social Sciences teams explored the beneficial impacts of the spirit of TOM being released to the world. The STEM team devised an innovative device to mitigate the effects of plastic pollution in water bodies. The ARTS team creatively retold a key moment in the life story of our very own Mr Lee Linsday.

Well done to everyone involved in TOM this year. All SCEGGS entries in the Sydney East Regional Competition were of a very high standard, with special congratulations going to the following teams on gaining awards:

Team 6 will now go on to compete in the NSW State Finals, to be held on Sunday September 22 at the University of New South Wales, Kensington Campus. We wish them all the very best. Thank you to the SCEGGS staff who acted as Team Facilitators, supporting the six teams that entered this year’s tournament.

Teams consisted of the following students and staff facilitators:

Tournament of Minds Facilitators (Secondary)
Sophie Craddock and Emily Quirk

Primary

We are very proud of our Year 5 and 6 students who participated in the Regional Finals of the Tournament of Minds Competition on Sunday 8 September at Randwick Boys High School. Primary School entered a team in each of the Language Literature, STEM and Arts disciplines. Each team worked hard to develop their Long-Term Challenge over six weeks and performed admirably on the day to present their Long-Term Challenge solution as well as compete in the unseen Spontaneous Challenge.

The STEM Challenge was titled, Not So Fantastic Plastic. The team was required to create an innovative device to remove or mitigate a specific type of plastic pollution. As part of the presentation, the girls had to demonstrate their working prototype and present a scaled drawing of the device. The STEM Team, consisting of Year 6 Matilda Reuss, Mackenzie Jothy, Chloe Park, Sarah Ibrahim, Mia Castro, Audrey Park and Susanna Brown, worked to address the problem of plastic pollution derived from medical waste with their creation of the Dewy Dexter 3610 – a machine that uses geothermal energy to melt plastic to create chairs that can be used in medical facilities. The girls approached this challenge with persistence and resilience, working well as a team and being awarded with a Merit Prize on the day.

Telling stories through the arts is a timeless way for people to share their experiences, passing wisdom and knowledge from one generation to another. The Arts Challenge required students to choose a living local person from their community to interview and discover their stories. The Arts Team, consisting of Year 6 Viola Heery, Alexandra Millin, Eve Parker, Annabelle Dempsey, Serafina Kwok and Holly Shennan, interviewed Aunty Viv and learnt much about her early life. The girls then needed to bring Aunty Viv’s story to life through storytelling forms including music, dance and visual arts. It was fabulous to see the girls bring a diverse range of skills together to perform confidently on the day. The team was awarded a Merit Prize on the day for their efforts. 

The Language Literature task required students to firstly select a fictional character from literature. They were then challenged to prepare to launch a biography for this character. However, at the 11^th hour, the character comes back from the past and is surprised to discover that the team has written a biography about them and something in the biography isn’t right! The Language Literature Team, consisting of Year 5 Eva Geha, Aleisha Yeung, Olivia Yeo, Annabel Ling, Eliana Raissis, Aisling Blackburn and Minttu Guss, chose to share the biography of Dr Suess’, Lorax. However, on his return from the past, the team were amazed to discover that the Lorax is not one person as we have all incorrectly assumed…there are, in fact, multiple Loraxes! In rewriting the history books with their creative performance, the Language Literature Team worked with determination to also be awarded with a Merit prize on the day.

Congratulations to all the Primary girls who participated in the Tournament of Minds Competition.

Tournament of Minds Facilitators (Primary)
Cristi Wilsmore, Kristy Williams & Geneieve Gloor