Tournament of Minds: Problem solving, friendship and fun!
On Saturday 12 September, STPP had three teams participating in a virtual Tournament of Minds (ToM) competition due to COVID-19. ToM is a problem solving program for teams of students from both primary and secondary years. Twenty-one children in total made up a team of years 3 - 4, years 4 - 5 and years 5 - 6.
The question this year was “An unusual object is found in an unusual place by an unusual group. The object needs to affect the past and the future”. The students were required to solve demanding, open-ended challenges from one of the following disciplines: the Arts, STEM, Literature and Social Sciences.
At STPP, values are instilled in every student to ensure they develop the social skills to thrive throughout life. Greta (Year 5) and Eva (Year 5) enjoyed learning new skills by working in teams to solve a challenge.
“Some of the challenges we faced during the contest were how we were going to explain the solution and decide on which idea we would use. We ended up banking all our ideas, changing them to suit everybody and to make sure we solved the problem. Writing the script was also a challenge as we needed to agree on one way to communicate the solution but with 7 people contributing. In the end, we all discussed how we could go ahead as a group and agreed on a script and solution and continued through to performing it,” Greta said.
“We learnt about teamwork and who had what strengths and weaknesses. We also learnt about the importance of communication and ensuring everyone has a job. We had to come up with different ways to work with one another to make sure we met the time frame and were able to present a finished solution,” Eva said.
The tournament's aim is to enhance the potential of our youth by developing diverse skills, enterprise, time management, and the discipline to work collaboratively within a challenging and competitive environment.
Tournament of Minds is an opportunity for students with a passion for learning and problem solving to demonstrate their skills and talents in an exciting, vibrant and public way. Well done teams!
