Tensions were high in the RDS on Sunday April 12 as the Credit Union All-Ireland School Quiz tested the 100 teams of four primary school-children knowledge on everything from the name of the chilli heat scale to how many sides has a tetradecagon. While these questions would stump the average person, the team from St Annin’s National School were more than capable and won the Competition B (11-13 age group ).
The team of Sam Dooher, Niamh Maguire, Roisin Duffy and Padraig Faherty, who each won a Samsung Galaxy Tablet, as well as money and a trophy for the school, were not just names picked out of a hat. Their classes ran demanding tests to see who would be able to handle the abstract questions that soon would be thrown at them.
The pupils felt that because they had gone to the quiz the previous year, they were more prepared and a lot less nervous than the rookies at the quiz. They also made it a rule not to look at the scoreboard until the end stages of the quiz to keep themselves from stressing out. “It didn’t really work though,” they said as they knew they had won before the announcement as credit union officials had already started congratulating them on winning.
The secret to their success they claim was the study sessions with Niamh’s mother as well as with their teachers, Mr Connelly and Ms O’Connor.
The aim of the competition, which has been running for 24 years, is to teach primary school children about teamwork and researching skills, as well as giving them a thirst for knowledge.
It is obvious from their tremendous success that these children will go on to do brilliant things in the future, but for now the most important thing to them was that they got off homework.
