UKMT Team Challenge

Posted: 31st March 2017

Our Mathematicians compete

For our Mathematicians it has been an exciting term. The latest competition was the UK Mathematics Trust (UKMT) Team Challenge held at Trinity School, Croydon, earlier in March.  Four pupils from Lower IV and Upper IV attended:  Siya Sehgal, Kyoka Iwami (Lower IV), Katie Fung and Naomi Jeffries (Upper IV).

Mr Pereira, Mathematics Department, here describes the competition:

‘Competing against thirty-nine, mainly grammar, schools was an exciting opportunity for our pupils and one where they rose to the challenge. The UKMT competition consists of four rounds:

Round 1: Ten Tough Questions that need to be answered in forty-five Minutes

Round 2 : The girls are put in pairs and have to complete a cross puzzle. One pair is given the down questions and the other the across questions. The pairs may only communicate via their assessor. They have forty-five minutes to complete the entire cross number.

Round 3: This is the shuttle round where pupils are once more placed in pairs and have to complete four questions in eight minutes. This is repeated four times. The first pair does a maths calculation which then is given to the second pair who uses that answer to answer their question (basically, maths substitution).

Round 4: This is the relay round. Here each pair answers one question then runs to the assessor to check if their answer is correct. If it is correct they then run to their other pair to hand them the next question which they must complete. If they get this correct they run back to their other pair to answer the question. If a pair has an incorrect answer they then have a second attempt to try the question.  If they do not succeed they need to pass the next question to their other pair.’

Siya Sehgal, Lower IVA, here tells us of her experience:

‘Naomi, Katie, Kyoka and I participated in the UKMT Team Maths Challenge. It took place in Trinity School, Surrey, and there were around 40 schools competing. There were four main challenges, they were: answering ten challenging questions, the cross number, the shuttle and the relay race. The challenge we did the best in was the cross number and we received full marks. At the end of all of the challenges we found out that we were placed fourteenth. We were so happy and proud, especially Mr Pereira. It was a fantastic opportunity and experience and I really enjoyed it!’

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