2014 School Magazine

MATHS CHALLENGE FOR YOUNG AUSTRALIANS ABIRAMI SOMASUNDARAM (9M) Throughout the year, the School has given us many opportunities to undertake extra maths challenges. I was involved in many competitions this year, two of which were the Maths Challenge for Young Australians (MCYA) and Queensland Association of Mathematics Teachers problem solving competition. The MCYA competition firstly consisted of a number of ‘Challenge’ problems that ran for a period of three weeks in which we were given six problems to solve that covered different aspects of maths. The second aspect was the ‘Enrichment’ series where students studied new mathematical concepts and then completed a number of different questions over a sixteen-week period. ■

YEAR 8 QUIZ AMY DURSUN (8M)

THIESS BRIDGE BUILDING COMPETITION KIA DAVIS (10R)

Could you guess for how many seconds a phone was ringing? Or who is the famous Greek mathematician by the name of Πυθαγόρας ? What about how much would it cost to purchase twenty-five Australian stamps? In Term III, three Year 8 students and a reserve competed in the regional Year 8 Maths Quiz held at St Joseph’s College. The team consisted of Zoe Clayden-Zabik (8W), Natalie DiMichele (8E), Amy Dursun (8M) and Rebecca Haley (8M). Along with several teams from other schools, the team challenged themselves with some thought-provoking problem solving, speed in the timed section, calculation accuracy in estimation and general knowledge about mathematics. Overall, the event was a very enjoyable one, and it’s certain that all of us had a great and rewarding experience. ■

As part of Engineering Week, three teams of BGGS girls, including myself, participated in the Thiess Spaghetti Bridge Building Competition. For this competition, we were required to build the strongest bridge possible using only spaghetti and glue. The bridge could weigh no more than 300 grams and had to span at least thirty-five centimetres. The process involved using our experience in planning, engineering skills and team work to design the strongest bridge that we could. Each team produced unique designs, gathering ideas from actual bridges and past experience. When it came to constructing the bridges, we found building with spaghetti very awkward. The spaghetti, being thin and brittle was hard to glue and broke easily, as opposed to using paddle pop sticks which some of us had previously used to build bridges. However, through team cooperation and perseverance, each team successfully created a strong bridge. Overall, it was a fun and challenging experience to work with girls from different grades, develop a greater understanding of engineering skills and further our problem solving skills. ■

THE AUSTRALIAN MATHEMATICS COMPETITION The Australian Mathematics Competition was held in August with strong representation from Girls Grammar once again this year. The competition is completed without the use of calculators and includes a combination of multiple choice questions and problems requiring students to generate their own solution. Many of the problems in this competition provide a significant challenge and often stimulate interesting discussions in mathematics classes. The girls performed commendably with Year 8 student, Catherine Li (8E), awarded a Prize and twenty-three girls achieving High Distinctions. ■

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