Young intellectuals are fast and joyful!
Where are Brazilians being asked not to land “lost” penguins, what type of economy does the kingdom of Arendelle have in the Frozen movie, and what rock band played in Antarctica? These and other questions were answered today by the participants of the Eurasian Intellect game, which was held as part of the XIII EEYF.
A record number of teams participated in the international intellectual and entertaining game “Intellect of Eurasia” within the framework of the Congress of Schoolchildren: they were 47. The team comprised 5-6 students in grades 8-11. A little less than half of the teams were present at the USUE House of Culture, the rest were connected online.
The guys were greeted by USUE Vice-Rector for Academic Affairs, Teaching Methods and Quality of Training, Doctor of Economics, Professor Dmitry Karkh: “It is nice that children not only from the Sverdlovsk region and other Russian regions but also from six CIS countries take part in the game! The ability to work in a team is highly valued by employers, and today you can successfully apply this skill. I wish you all to win!”
The chair of the coordinating council of Russian compatriots in Kyrgyzstan, Olga Frolova, came to support the young intellectuals of Eurasia.
“You will show your horizons, logic, ingenuity, gain new knowledge, which, as you know, is best learned playfully. And the emotions that today’s adventure will give you will stay with you for a long time. Good luck, believe in yourself - you can do much more than you think!” Olga Frolova admonished the participants.
The host of the game was Elena Nikolaeva, chief specialist of the Department for Coordinating and Conducting Events at the Golden Section Support Fund for Talented Children and Youth. She reminded the participants of the rules. The game is played as a quiz. Each team, using only one smartphone, connects to the game using a QR code. A question appears on the screen, and you need to give the correct answer faster than your opponents. The leaderboard is updated continuously, allowing teams to “bask in the spotlight” by turns.
They offered the teams 60 questions about music, literature, mathematics, economics, national dishes, historical facts, cultural and geographical features of different countries, and even why bruises are purple. Some questions and answers to them caused smiles, and schoolchildren sometimes sacrificed points in order to make the whole room laugh with deliberate mistakes.
Some questions would have baffled those who left school a long time ago. For example, “What did the son of missionary Warren do 20 years after he disappeared on the Miss Hobart mail plane over Bass Strait in 1934?” As it turned out, the son of the missionary, David Warren, did not find the missing plane, as 15% of the teams thought. And he did not make a description of the coast of the island of Tasmania - 7% of the teams were inclined to this option. He invented the flight recorder (“black box”).
An even more serious discrepancy in the answers was caused by the question “what happened in 1973 to a lone acacia in the Sahara, which for many years was used by travelers as an orienting point in the desert?” 24% of tourist teams suspected they had burned a poor tree. 40% voted for the tree was broken from gusts of wind. Only 36% of the teams guessed the correct answer: a drunk driver knocked it down.
In the second half of the game, they revealed top five: schoolchildren from Ust-Kamenogorsk, Polevskoy, Rezh, Novouralsk, and Yekaterinburg. As a result, the “Nameless” team (school-gymnasium No. 10, Ust-Kamenogorsk), who participated online, won. “Silver” was taken by the “Ancharted” team (Lyceum No. 56, Novouralsk). The “Fishing Tackle” team (gymnasium No. 202, Yekaterinburg took the third place (only three points behind). Award documents of participants will be considered when accruing extra points to the Unified State Examination upon entering USUE.
“We often play at the lessons of social science and law, once again we closed ranks and left no crumbs,” Alexander Revin, captain of the Fishing Tackle team, said. “For sure, we will participate in the forum again!”
Participants from the top three teams received prizes and award badges “Star of Eurasia”. The jury also singled out the fastest, most joyful and self-confident participants. Members of all teams received participation certificates and memorable gifts.
“The questions were interesting, it’s a pity we didn’t get up to speed right away, but it was still very interesting,” Diana Isakova from the “Veselye” team shared her impressions (grade 8 of the Experimental Boarding School “Arctica,” Neryungri). “We managed to enter into the team spirit. In general, we liked it here! Besides, I know that tenth-graders from our school came to USUE in the fall and also participated in an interesting event.”
Ekaterina Pastushkova, coordinator of the Congress of Schoolchildren, head of the USUE Career Guidance Office, noted that in 2023 the number of participants in the “Intellect of Eurasia” game had doubled, and highly appreciated the level of training of schoolchildren.
“Almost all the most difficult and tricky questions were correctly answered by most teams. I was also struck by the speed with which the answers were given: in the first few seconds, the ‘race’ on the leaderboard began! It was a very positive time; it was a wonderful experience. I think that the practice of such quizzes should be widespread everywhere,” Ekaterina Pastushkova said.
