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| Amit Chaudhuri at the Starmark Inter-School Quiz 2011. Picture by Anindya Shankar Ray |
Quiz time city’s favourite pastime
Author Amit Chaudhuri was not just the chief guest in this event, he also played the occasional quizmaster for the audience. The event was the Starmark Inter-School Quiz 2011, that saw 97 three-member teams from 43 city schools locking horns at Gyan Manch recently. Six teams qualified for the finals after a 30-question preliminary round.
“General knowledge is a preoccupation, not an indication of how educated or intelligent you are. Brushing up on general knowledge is a favourite pastime of this part of the world, especially Calcutta. I can say so after observing other cities,” said the author at the event. And he was proved right, as the fight between the finalists was close.
Charanpreet Singh threw a mixed bag of easy and tough questions at the participants. Who is the famous uncle of Mortie and Freddie? Mickey Mouse, answered the students.
And those that they failed to answer went to the audience, prompting the quizmaster to quip: “Thank you for saving me the ignominy of answering my own questions.”
The finalists faced direct, audio-visual, theme-based and “Who am I” rounds before Siddhant Agarwal, Kartikeyea Desia and Paraj Mathur of Birla High School for Boys were declared winners.
National Gems Higher Secondary School and Lakshmipat Singhania Academy came second and third, respectively.
The winners received Rs 20,000 for their school library and consoles for themselves. The first runners-up won Rs 15,000 for the school library and MP3 players for themselves while the third runners-up got Rs 10,000 for the school library and an Apple iPod shuffle each.
St James School, Calcutta International School and South Point High School were the other finalists.
Math has art angle
Can art and mathematics go hand in hand? Yes, proved Farah Farooque at her workshop on Mathematical Art on February 12.
The workshop was part of “Celebrating Mathematics” — a series of events that highlight the popular aspects of math and its modern applications — organised by the British Council, in association with the Birla Industrial and Technological Museum (BITM) and Jagadish Bose National Science Talent Search.
The workshop, held at the BITM, saw 20 children between eight and 11 years get involved in activities that highlighted the relevance and omnipresence of mathematics.
The first activity introduced the children to the concept of rotational symmetry. The next round brought out the geometrical symmetry of shapes through mirror images.
Fraction quilting was the third activity. Participants were shown different ways of dividing shapes, colouring them and then rearranging them with individual creativity.
Ritam Saha came up with one of the best patterns, using his favourite colours: red, yellow and black.
In the next activity, bangles, rectangles and two colours were used to create optical illusions. Weaving was yet another interesting activity.
Farooque, a teacher at Calcutta International School, also showed the participants how to weave a yarn with drinking straws. “Can you see the mathematics in weaving now?” she asked her awestruck spectators.
“I knit all the time. I am sure I’ll love weaving, too,” smiled little Antara Dasgupta, who is home-schooled.
“Children never expect mathematics to be enjoyable. But when two vastly different fields like math and art are allied, they are happily surprised to see how entertaining it is,” added Farooque.
Chit chat
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| Students of Indus Valley World School perform at the Science City auditorium |
Heritage tour
The annual function of Indus Valley World School, Indcon 2011, was held at the Science City auditorium recently. The students put up a cultural show to mark the occasion. The pre-primary section staged a play, Noah’s Ark, that won much applause. The most interesting part of the programme was reserved for the last. God’s Kaleidoscope, a play presented by the primary and middle-school students. Through the play, the audience was taken on a cultural tour of India through the eyes of a boy called Krish. The play included various dance forms like chhou and the bamboo dance. Sitar player Purbayan Chatterjee and actress Paoli Dam were the guests at the event.
Romantic quiz
The Centre for Studies in Romantic Literature (CSRL), Jadavpur University, organised its annual seminar —Romantics’ Quiz 2011— at the HL Roy auditorium on February 3 and 4. The first day saw participants presenting papers on topics ranging from Keats, Tagore to Russian folklore. A quiz was held on the second day. The finalists included two teams from JU, two from St Xavier’s College and one from Chandernagore Government College. The questions ranged from direct ones to googlies like why John Keats was nicknamed “Junkets” by his friend Leigh Hunt (Keats pronounced his name this way in his cockney accent). The dumb charade round was the most entertaining, with the participants fervently trying to enact the The Solitary Reaper or the Moonlight Sonata. A St Xavier’s College team, Visions Revisited, emerged the winner. The first and second runners-up teams were both from Jadavpur University.
