Newtown And Brookfield Students Test Themselves In Odyssey Of

The Mind Spontaneous Scrimmage

By Eliza Hallabeck

Multiple rooms at Reed Intermediate School were taken up on Friday, January 14, for this year’s Odyssey of the Mind Spontaneous Scrimmage, which brought Newtown and Brookfield students together to solve problems.

Odyssey of The Mind is an international problem-solving, creative thinking, and performing arts program that is offered as an after school activity. Teams of up to seven students work on solving a long-term problem throughout the school year and practice spontaneous exercises, similar to exercises in Odyssey of The Mind competitions.

The Friday evening event marked the third annual Spontaneous Scrimmage held in Newtown. This year, as in past years, the event was organized by Newtowner Ann Ziluck and Cindy Carroll of Brookfield.

“This year is a lot more organized,” said Newtown Middle School eighth grader Zachary Weiland as he and other members of his team, Team 9, oversaw the registration desk just inside the entrance to the school.

Fellow Team 9 member Michael Ziluck, Ms Ziluck’s son, said more teams also signed up this year to participate in the Spontaneous Scrimmage.

This year’s Spontaneous Scrimmage was held just three months before the seven teams from Reed, four teams from Newtown Middle School, one team from the high school, and other teams from Brookfield head to Bristol to participate in Odyssey of the Mind’s State Competition on March 26. Friday’s event lasted until 8 pm, and included a dinner break. Problems were held in Reed’s cafetorium and in other rooms of school.

There were nine different problems for the teams to work themselves through, according to Ms Ziluck, and judges oversaw the teams’ efforts for each problem.

“The program has just been started at the high school this year,” said Ms Ziluck, “thanks to Dawn Gray, so her team will be the first team ever to represent NHS in Odyssey this year. There certainly is a feeder program from the other schools in place, so hopefully some of those teams will continue right through high school.”

At the state competition in Bristol, the teams will be judged in multiple categories for their long-term problems and a spontaneous problem, which could take the form of a verbal problem, a verbal/hands-on problem, or a hands-on problem.

One problem at this year’s Spontaneous Scrimmage had students work as a team to measure the midway point of multiple strings using various objects to determine the exact middle. Treasurer for the Connecticut Odyssey of the Mind Executive Board and the state Problem Captain Bob Zinser judged the problem.

“I just enjoy this part of it,” said Mr Zinser after describing his station’s problem to Team 6, “so I got involved.”

Mr Zinser said he first got involved in Odyssey of the Mind when his three daughters became involved in the after school program. That was roughly 19 years ago, he said, and since then he has remained active with Odyssey of the Mind.

Looking around Reed’s cafetorium, Ms Ziluck said she found all the problems students were working to solve to be amazing. From elementary-aged students to the group from NHS, Ms Ziluck said students find different ways to approach the problems. One problem, across the cafeteria from the string measuring problem, asked students to toss objects over a barrier and land it between two points. The students could chose different objects to throw, and could use other objects to throw the object of their choice, like a penny or pencil.

“This is the kind of stuff you get at a competition,” said Ms Ziluck. “You never know what you are going to get.”

For her team, Team 9, Ms Ziluck said the students gather together to train multiple times a month. Training for the upcoming state competition means practicing solving problems, big and small. Ms Ziluck said practice problems could range from listing things that are blue, with the most creative responses gaining the most points, to building certain designs out of a given number of objects.

In Odyssey of the Mind, said Ms Ziluck, “They have to be ready to think on their feet.”

As Team 9 members practiced tossing objects at her station, judge Chelsea Fowler monitored what the students were doing with judge Emily Lockhart.

“[Odyssey of the Mind] is really great,” said Ms Fowler. “It’s something I wish I had known about when I was young enough to compete.”

Three teams from Reed made it to the Odyssey of The Mind World Finals three years ago, representing the state. This year the World Finals event is scheduled at the University of Maryland May 27 through 30.

More information on Odyssey of The Mind is available at Connecticut Odyssey of The Mind’s website, www.ctom.org, or at the National site, www.odysseyofthemind.com.

For video from Friday’s Spontaneous Scrimmage, visit www.newtownbee.com.