Pupils’ book smarts put to the test
Avid young readers have been put through their paces – and the pages of their favourite fictional words.
The Feilding Civic Centre was packed for the pub quiz-styled Kids’ Lit Quiz Manawatū heats on Tuesday.
Four-person teams from more than a dozen schools in the wider Manawatū and Wairarapa were peppered with 10 rounds of questions covering a myriad of youth fiction themes from the worlds of Narnia and Hogwarts to My Little Ponies.
A shrewd decision by Masterton Intermediate A to make the deitiesthemed round their joker - accumulating double points - proved a master-stroke for year 8 classmates Vivian Maguire, Alby Rutherford, Yas Jar and Poppy Matchett, who scored 10 out of 10 for the round.
The team finished 5.5 points ahead of Faith City, from Whanganui, and move forward to the national finals in June and the chance to earn a place in the world finals in Canberra.
Vivian, 12, who along with Alby, 13, had been in a team that finished sixth at last year’s contest, said they found the “Deities” round really easy, but they had struggled a bit with the “Tales” section.
All four were keen readers, and Alby said he had already read 50 books this year.
Thoughout the event, which has been running for 33 years, children huddled and exchanged frantic whispers as they tried to recall key details from stories, such as the colour of unicorn blood in the Harry Potter novels.
It was all intended to foster the love of reading and a sense of community.
Quizmaster Wayne Mills also posed the odd question to the crowd of parents watching.
He noted that due to the popularity of fiction franchises, children tended to be reading more in terms of volume, but less in variety of stories.
The winning Masterton team’s coach Richard Lennox, who led the school’s reading curriculum, said this was probably true, but so long as kids were reading something, he was happy.
He said he encouraged children to read physical books rather than from electronic tablets to foster the tactile connection.
Third place went to Ross Intermediate School, while the perennially dominant Palmerston North Intermediate Normal School had to settle for fourth-equal with Whakarongo School.