This year is the first time Mullion School has entered this children’s competition which celebrates reading and general knowledge. The quiz is now an international event with teams entering from around the world. Started by an enthusiastic New Zealander, Wayne Mills, the quiz has built up an expanding number of countries participating.
We began at Mullion School with heats in teams, played out as the format in the “real” competition, then progressed to individual knowledge. We picked our best players and took two teams of Year 7 and 8 pupils to Truro College for the Southwest region competition at the end of November. Our teams were:
Mullion 1 Mullion 2
Rosie Dorrell Charlotte Douglas
Hannah Griffiths Estella Dunkley
Ruari McDonald Matilda Harding
Grace Sherratt Tommy Price
No scores were given out during the competition, which comprises ten rounds of ten questions. Teams had to decide which round to play the joker on to double their points, and there were a range of individual speed answers, where the first person to put their hand up and answer a question received a prize; Ruari and Matilda won money on this “fun” addition to the quiz, with Ruari answering a long and complicated question on a new word created and used twice in Dystopian novels, BEFORE the question was even completed!
Pupils who had taken part in our heats came to support and ended up helping collect the competition answers in at the end of each round; in fact, they were so helpful the organisers rewarded them with books, too!
We were all absolutely delighted, that in our first competition, Mullion 1 Team won, beating Exeter School into 3rd and Truro School into 2nd place by a margin of 10 points. Mullion 2 Team came joint 5th, again a fantastic achievement.
Credit is due to the whole team effort of Mullion School, our super pupils who so calmly coped with 42 other teams! We were so proud of all our pupils and hope that Team 2 and our supporters will be encouraged to come back next year!
The team now goes to the National competition in London on Friday 5 December, where we wish them well, and hope they enjoy being ambassadors for Mullion School, Cornwall and the Southwest. We will keep you posted in the next newsletter.
Ooops, and just in case we win through, where in the world are the International Finals next July?..South Africa… Australia…India…China…? No! Falmouth, just down the road!
