Primary Maths Competition, 2015

BISS PUXI HOSTS THE FOBISIA PRIMARY MATHS CHALLENGE 2015

From the 6-8 March 2015, top primary mathematicians from across Asia’s British international schools came to BISS Puxi to compete in the two-day FOBISIA Primary Maths Challenge.  Andrew Foster, Primary Maths Coordinator, ran the event and explains all the different challenges and tests the children had to complete.

This competition was designed to stretch the very best mathematicians from the schools attending, most students being in Year 6, and there were a lot of challenges for them to compete in, including both individual and team challenges. There were 124 children from 30 international schools here with 31 teams competing.

On Friday the mathematicians took part in the Maths trail at Minhang Park, an ice breaker activity. All the children were mixed up into different teams, with only one child from each school per team. The competitors had to work out co-ordinates on a map and then once they had found their way to the co-ordinates, they had to answer questions specific to that location. In the afternoon things got a bit more serious with the individual events including a mental mathematics test, a written test – word problems, a logic paper and a spatial paper. After the first day of maths there was a trip to

the Bund with a boat cruise down the river, to give all the traveling teams a chance to see the spectacular Shanghai skyline.

On Saturday it was time for the Team Challenge. There were lots of sections to this challenge and the children had to really work together to complete them all.

First was a ‘Countdown’ round. Similar to the popular British game show, this is a game of mental maths and well done to our team that won this round!

Followed by a written paper. The investigation round was next. The teams had to investigate step pyramids and present their findings on

paper. The logic round was next. The Split relay saw teams split in half and the children had to run and get a question to answer with their partner

as quickly as possible. The final round was the construction round – building a wind powered vehicle. This was chosen because China

was the first country to build one. In the year 500 AD, a famous Chinese philosopher constructed a carriage powered by the wind, which could carry 30 men and travel hundreds of kilometres every day!

The event ended with an award ceremony and a big celebration dinner in school.

Individual Results:    Well done to Matthew Sigit from the British School of Jakarta who won the individual competition.

Team Results:     The overall competition was won by Bangkok Patana School. Well done to all teams!

Emma from 5B said of the competition: “The FOBISIA Primary Maths Challenge was very challenging but I enjoyed it thoroughly. My favourite activity was the team construction round. We had to construct a wind powered land vehicle. Although building it took a lot of planning, construction and teamwork it was worth it in the end!”

Joshua from Year 6 felt the pressure of the event: “This event was a challenge for me as there is a lot of pressure when competing against over 120 children!”

By Andrew Foster, Primary Maths Coordinator, British International School of Shanghai, Puxi