Stretching and challenging.
Run by the University of Leeds, the Intermediate Maths Challenge is a national competition we, at St Augustine’s Priory, regularly enter and this year we again achieved wonderful results. Girls from Upper V, Lower V and Upper IV sat the challenge before Half Term and St Augustine’s Priory pupils garnered the grand sum of twenty-three certificates. We achieved gold, silver and bronze awards and congratulations must go to all our entrants for their superb performance.
Our pupils also won through to the next round: the three girls who qualified for the Year 11 European round, which takes place on 21st March, are Katie Fung, Naomi Jeffries and Jasmine Cabraal and, qualifying for the Year 9 European round is Ayaka Kuromiya. Mathematics is a challenge we enjoy and rise to!
Gold winners were Katie Fung, Naomi Jeffries and Jasmine Cabraal (Upper V), Silver winners were Angela Shan, Eleanor Kaffo, Lizzie Higham and Samar Hussain, also Upper V, Romy Khatkhuda and Sennen Powell (Lower V), and Ayaka Kuromiya, Maki Mizunoe and Sofia Krunic (Upper IV). Bronze awards went to Kashish Mittal, Mehru Mittal and Andrea Barry (Upper V), Tanita Jose, Bronwyn Eliis and Siya Sehgal (Lower V) and Lily Rai, Adriana Krickic and Ana Navarro (Upper IV).
Mrs Bennet, Head of Mathematics reports, ;On 7th February six girls from Upper IV, Lower V and Upper V took part in a national competition run by the University of Leeds, very aptly called the Maths Challenge. They were faced with a set of 25 multiple choice questions, increasingly difficult, and some with penalty points associated for getting them wrong! The phrase multiple choice makes it sound much easier than it is, because the alternative answers provided are ones that are arrived at by making common mistakes! So simply finding the answer in the list does not mean it is correct. And just to make the experience even more fun, it is a strictly non-calculator exam! Calculators can be very useful, but we also expect pupils to be able to manipulate numbers and values without them.
Answers are sent off to the university for marking (machine read, hence the need to use an HB pencil) and traditionally the results come through during the February half term. This year was no exception and so on the first day back we were able to give out the exciting news that the girls had amassed twenty three certificates in total.
There are Gold, Silver and Bronze awards available to the highest scorers with the further promise of entry into the European rounds (at two different levels) for the very best.
In Upper V, there were three Gold awards, and all three of these girls are through to the higher European round known as the Pink Kangaroo. There were also four Silver awards and three Bronze awards. In Lower V, there were two Silver awards (with identical scores) and three Bronze awards. In Upper IV, there were three Silver awards. The top scorer in Upper IV qualified for the lower level European round, known as the Grey Kangaroo. There were also three Bronze awards.
Here are a couple of the questions asked on this year’s challenge which you may like to try:
There are four people, some of whom always tell the truth. The others always lie.
The first person said, “An odd number of us always tell the truth”.
The second person said, “An even number of us always tell the truth”.
The third person said, “A prime number of us always tell the truth”.
The fourth person said, “A square number of us always tell the truth”.
How many of these four people were telling the truth?
A 0 B 1 C 2 D 3 E 4
When 5655 is divided by a two-digit positive integer N, the remainder is 11.
When 5879 is divided by the same positive integer N, the remainder is 14.
What is the sum of the digits of N?
A 6 B 7 C 8 D 9 E 10
The Kangaroo rounds are held in school on Thursday 21st March, and we very much hope there will be further certificates resulting from this event, in due course.’
Categories: Priory Post Senior Whole School