The Academic Smackdown is a house event that runs for those kids who might not be gifted in a physical way, but are in a mental way. Far too many pupils don't become involved in sports days and given that they are the main in-house competition for many schools I felt this was a bit unfair. Smart kids need to show off too, and this is their chance!
The event runs over one day after the end of GCSE exams with period 1 put aside for preparation and years 7, 8, 9 and 10 compete during periods 2 - 5. I toyed with the idea of naming the event the Academic Heptathlon, but was unsure about the number of departments that would submit a round for the competition and went with 'Academic Smackdown' instead.
To run the event, we hired (and later bought) a set of buzzers from Buzzgold. They block out any buzzing for 5 seconds after it has been pressed the by the first team, so it doesn't allow human error for judging who was first.
A Year 10 Young Leader (or two) present each event and in the weeks leading up to the event interested parties are brought together to choose a team of 6 (4 take part in each round, with 2 subs for changing around) for their team in their year group.
At the moment, we have a starter to put some points on the board and build confidence and rounds in English, Humanities, ICT, Maths, MFL, PE, RE and Science - in the event that these rounds don't fill the time, a 'popular culture'/'In The News' round is included. I also like to include some trailers for upcoming cinema releases to maintain interest between rounds and I also included some 'One for the audience' rounds this year!
If you'd like to run an event at your school, I am happy to share the files. Just send me a message using the contact form on the home page and I'll get back to you very quickly.
The event runs over one day after the end of GCSE exams with period 1 put aside for preparation and years 7, 8, 9 and 10 compete during periods 2 - 5. I toyed with the idea of naming the event the Academic Heptathlon, but was unsure about the number of departments that would submit a round for the competition and went with 'Academic Smackdown' instead.
To run the event, we hired (and later bought) a set of buzzers from Buzzgold. They block out any buzzing for 5 seconds after it has been pressed the by the first team, so it doesn't allow human error for judging who was first.
A Year 10 Young Leader (or two) present each event and in the weeks leading up to the event interested parties are brought together to choose a team of 6 (4 take part in each round, with 2 subs for changing around) for their team in their year group.
At the moment, we have a starter to put some points on the board and build confidence and rounds in English, Humanities, ICT, Maths, MFL, PE, RE and Science - in the event that these rounds don't fill the time, a 'popular culture'/'In The News' round is included. I also like to include some trailers for upcoming cinema releases to maintain interest between rounds and I also included some 'One for the audience' rounds this year!
If you'd like to run an event at your school, I am happy to share the files. Just send me a message using the contact form on the home page and I'll get back to you very quickly.