Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, March 27, 1994 TAG: 9403270044
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: E1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: MELISSA DEVAUGHN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Long
He sort of looked like Mary. The dress was right. The bonnet was right. He even carried a staff fit for any good herds(wo)man.
But something was a little off with 12-year-old Ace Godfrey's costume of Mother Goose's "Mary and her Little Lamb." Maybe it was the clunky black Reebok athletic shoes poking out underneath his dress. Or maybe it was the lopsided, black-haired wig or the unevenly applied crimson lipstick.
"I kind of humiliated myself dressing up like that, but we'll do anything to get more points," Ace said at Saturday's Blue Ridge Mountain Odyssey of the Mind regional competition.
Scenes like this were common at the competition as students were challenged to find creative ways to solve various problems - without spending lots of money on expensive solutions. The Odyssey of the Mind competition is one of the largest academic contests held in the New River Valley and beyond. Winners of Saturday's event will have the chance to compete in Richmond at the state level.
There were six categories at this year's regional competition, which was held at Blacksburg High School and the town's community center. Eighteen teams in four divisions competed in each category.
In the "OM-Believable Music" category, Ace and his teammates, all from Eastern Elementary School in Giles County, had to figure out a way to create three musical instruments and present them in a short skit. The hard part, said Ace's teammate, Amelia Tuckwiller, was reaching the consensus to sing "Mary Had a Little Lamb" while banging on their newly invented instruments - two sets of "chimes" and a "bow-in-a-bucket."
"Everybody had ideas, and we wanted to use them all, but you have to work together as a team," she said. "That's part of the whole [contest]."
In the "Mini-Terrain Vehicles" category, pupils from Christiansburg Middle School went with a spy theme for their demonstration, using homemade vehicles to deliver "top-secret photos" across an obstacle course. In reality, they were trying to demonstrate their creativity in building vehicles that could pass various types of barricades.
"I was so nervous to do this in front of the judges," 13-year-old Frankie Guill said. "My shoulders were tense, and my knees were aching." But, he said, "it was still fun" to demonstrate the months of work he and his teammates put into the project.
In the high school multipurpose room, a group of eighth-graders from Macy McClaugherty School in Giles County prepared for the "Furs, Fins and Feathers" category, where their challenge was to give a humorous performance depicting the life of an animal from the animal's perspective. They chose an environmentally oriented dialogue between a puffer fish and a crab. After the puffer fish sees human beings, the crab urges the fish to stay away from man, convincing it that human beings are destroying their ocean and are a danger to all fish.
"Everything would have gone great, if my crab eyes hadn't fallen off - that's what I played," said 14-year-old Becky McCracken.
"Well, my fins fell off, and that wasn't very good, either," 13-year-old Heather Austin, who was the puffer fish, said.
A team of fifth-graders from Bethel Elementary School near Radford performed a scene from "The Iliad" and gave it a twist in the "classics" category. Their challenge: to tie in a historical event from the 20th century with the scene in "The Iliad." The pupils chose to show the similarities between "The Iliad" and the "St. Valentine's Day Massacre," which occurred in 1929.
"We figured they went together good, because it was like war and blood and massacres and stuff," said 11-year-old David Strathy.
In the most technical category - "Set it Free" - pupils from Gilbert Linkous Elementary School met the challenge of building a structure of wood and glue that could withstand a certain amount of weight and, when it finally broke, safely project a ping pong ball. The more weight their structure could hold, the better they would place in the competition.
"We would have been happier if our structure held more weight. But we did release the ping pong ball, and I think we might even win first place," 10-year-old Deepa Nachiappan said.
The Blue Ridge Mountain Region covers the New River Valley, Patrick, Craig and Henry counties and the city of Martinsville. However, only one school, McCleary Elementary School in Craig County, was from outside the New River Valley.
\ THE WINNERS:
\ OM-Believable Music: Gilbert Linkous Elementary, Eastern Elementary, Radford High.
Mini-Terrain Vehicles: Dalton Intermediate, Radford High.
The Iliad: Margaret Beeks Elementary, Blacksburg Middle; Radford High.
Set It Free: Elliston-Lafayette, Radford High.
Furs, Fins and Feathers: Gilbert Linkous B, Mary McClaugherty.
Ranatra Fusca Creativity Awards also were presented to teams or individuals exhibiting exceptional creativity. Winners were:
OM-Believable Music: Falling Branch Elementary and Radford High. Mini-Terrain Vehicles: Christiansburg Middle. The Iliad: Margaret Beeks A, Margaret Beeks A student Jenny Law, Blacksburg Middle, Radford High and Eastern Elementary. Set It Free: Radford High and Gilbert Linkous. Furs, Fins and Feathers: Riner Elementary, Mary McClaugherty and Giles High.
by CNB