The first Imagination Gaming Inter-School Tournament of the new academic year has already been and gone, with plenty more to come, and what a fantastic day it was!
Monday’s event took place at St Anne’s CE Primary School in Worksop, with teams from 5 other schools joining their host team for a day of fun and friendly competition. Having already worked with St. Annes to introduce games into the school day, their enthusiasm and recognition of the value of such activities as part of school life had them eager to host a tournament and show some of their family of schools what it was all about.
“Fantastic Day! Many skills learnt from all games, social skills, maths, spelling etc. Great for Children to work with other schools.”
Mrs Joy Blood, Dunham-on-Trent CE Primary
As everyone arrived in the morning, including teams from across the area (pictured bottom), the mood was set immediately with a range of quick fire games purposely to make everyone feel comfortable in the surroundings and get the energy pumping straight away! Games such as 3×4=Swat (above), and Maki Stack (below), are perfect for that, with simple rules and exciting gameplay to loosen everyone up while still challenging their brains.
“I really liked everything about today because I met new people, played new games and we all had a great time.”
Sienna (10 yrs), St. Augustines
Once everyone was settled in, it was time to learn some more games, likely to be in the days tournament. Together we looked at Zeus On The Loose, Pirate Gold, Doodle Rush, Bananagrams (My First) and Get Packing.
All these games were deliberately chosen to provide different challenges that would each require different skills to master. As well as providing variation, this is also key to balancing the day for the participants, so if a particular skill isn’t your strong point, there will be others that will be, providing the participants with both confidence and challenge throughout the day.
These games cover maths, reasoning, drawing, literacy and logic skills amongst others, and are a great example of how games can be engaging, exciting and educational all at the same time.
“I liked the fun games we played because they were educational and enjoyable”
Ewan (10 yrs), Sparken Hill Academy
Doodle Rush (below) for example, looks like a crazy race to draw and guess each others objects, but at the same time as challenging drawing skills it is a great conversation piece to discuss the defining characteristics of a given object and how we can describe something by simply focussing on it’s key identifying properties…
“I enjoyed seeing the children persevere with the games – they didn’t give up. I particularly noticed this with the ‘suitcase’ game… I think I would’ve sat on the case to close it!”
Mrs Catherine Kirkham, St. Annes CE Primary
After a mornings practice of all the games, with each team honing their skills and sharing strategies, it was time for the tournament…
Now all the students were split up and put on a table with 3 other students, all from different schools. It’s amazing to watch how easily the children mixed, with a common objective in a competitive yet welcoming environment, they were ready to play.
Today we were able to all play a massive 5 different games, with each group moving around to the next game throughout the afternoon. Each time they collected points for both their team and themselves, which were constantly fed into the super-computer as the tournament progressed.
“The games keep your brain active from beginning to end. They were really fast moving and this added to the excitement.”
Mrs Yvonne Reeson, St. Peter’s CE Gringley on the Hill
By the time the games were over, and the results were in, everyone had clearly had a fantastic day… but of course were eager to find out the results
So after all that… WHO WON?!?! … See all the teams below brandishing their well-earned certificates and some serious smiles, along with the winning team and highest individual scorer of the day and their new trophies!
The team from St. Peter’s C of E Gringley on the Hill
The team from Sparken Hill…
Our wonderful hosts, St. Anne’s C of E
Dunham On Trent C of E School…
and, yes, the eventual winners of the whole thing… the team from…
St. Augustines C of E!!!
Finally – Well done Mia from the hosts St. Annes, as she took home the individual high scorer award… but only after a closely fought tie-break with Ewan! Great gamesmanship from both, but there can be only one!!!
As always a huge thank you to our hosts, and to all the staff and children that made this Inter-school tournament such a success. If you would like to see something like this at your school, or want to know about the many different ways that Imagination Gaming can Engage, Excite and Educate your children (and colleagues!)… get in touch now at [email protected]
