Odyssey Of The Mind Spontaneous Scrimmage Held

By Eliza Hallabeck

This year’s Odyssey of the Mind Spontaneous Scrimmage brought 26 teams to Reed Intermediate School on Friday, January 27, according to Ann Ziluck, one of Newtown’s coordinators for the program.

Along with Ms Ziluck at the high school, Dawn Gray also coordinates at the high school, and Michelle Hankin coordinates the program at Reed.

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.

Odyssey of the Mind, as Ms Ziluck has said in the past, has six problems that teams may choose from each year, including a “primary” problem for children in grades kindergarten through second. Newtown is set to have teams compete this year at the state level of the competition. Teams work all through the school year and present their Long Term solutions in the form of an eight-minute performance, which includes setting up props. Teams have three scoring categories: Long Term Problem, Style, and Spontaneous. The top three teams in each problem and division receive medals and the top two are invited to attend World Finals, which will be held in Iowa later this year.

The 26 teams that attended this year’s Spontaneous Scrimmage rotated through a possible 12 stations. Each station had teams work to solve different problems in an allotted amount of time. Judges were also on site to monitor the teams and score their performances for each problem, similar to what the student teams will face in a competition.

A Reed fifth and sixth grade team, called Joe White and the Seven Dwarfs, after the team’s coach, Joe White, sat in Reed’s cafetorium between solving different problems during the Spontaneous Scrimmage.

“I think it is a good experience so far,” said sixth grader Rachel Tramposch. “This is my second year.”

Rachel said the program’s allowance for creativity drew her to it.

Reed fifth grader Angella Kousidis said Odyssey of the Mind is “really awesome and fun.”

“[The Spontaneous Scrimmage] is a little nerve racking, but other than that it is mostly fun,” said Angella.

According to Ms Ziluck, the Spontaneous Scrimmage offered three verbal problems, four verbal hands-on problems, and five hands-on problems for the teams to solve.

Cindy Carroll from Brookfield brought all of the spontaneous materials with her, according to Ms Ziluck, and Ms Ziluck oversaw the administration, scheduling, and organization for the Spontaneous Scrimmage.

Yanni Kousidis, another member of Joe White and the Seven Dwarfs, also said this was his team’s second year participating with Odyssey of the Mind.

“Two years ago, I persuaded my dad to join this as a coach,” said Yanni, “and now we are still doing it.”

Odyssey of the Mind, Yanni said, offers creative team work exercises and chances to meet new people and visit new places.

Ms Ziluck said events like the Spontaneous Scrimmage are important, especially for newer teams and coaches.

“They all see the bigger picture after one of these events,” said Ms Ziluck.

One of the problems during the event, according to Ms Ziluck, had teams work to build the highest tower possible using only index cards, and without speaking to one another. 

“The younger teams watching were fascinated to see how my team was able to communicate not to breathe near the cards,” said Ms Ziluck, about her high school aged Odyssey of the Mind team. “One student inhaled with great exaggeration and then blew out the breathe to the side to communicate ‘don’t breathe on the cards, they will fall over.’ And I watched the elementary students’ eyes grow wide with interest as the older students built a one-meter tower of index cards with the final card bent in half and placed vertically on the tower.”

One part of Odyssey of the Mind is that coaches are not allowed to help their teams solve the determined Long Term problems, but, Ms Ziluck said, they can oversee how much teams are prepared for spontaneous problems.

Ms Ziluck said over all, Newtown’s fourth annual Spontaneous Scrimmage was terrific.

“We are very thankful that we have such outstanding support from [Reed Intermediate School Principal] Sharon Epple and the Reed administration for this annual event,” Ms Ziluck said. “It is one of the finest enrichment programs in the world combining team building, problem solving, engineering, script writing, performing, arts and crafts, and enthusiasm!”

While it is too late for teams to sign up for this year’s Odyssey of the Mind, Ms Ziluck said interested students or parents can contact her at annziluck@aol.com or Dawn Gray at momgray3@gmail.com for information about starting a team for next year.

Ms Ziluck also said if Newtown teams pass the state level of the Odyssey of the Mind competition and become eligible for the World Finals, fundraising to finance the trip to Iowa will be scheduled around March. One fundraising event Ms Ziluck expects to make a return to the Fairfield Hills Campus this year is the Bunny Watch Hayrides, offered last April.