Year 9 Physics ‘Big Quiz’ 2015
On Wednesday 21st January twelve Year 9 students took part in the 10th annual Physics ‘Big Quiz’ at the University of Birmingham. There were 75 teams taking part, with 300 pupils from all over the West Midlands and Staffordshire.
Brandon Masih writes: “We arrived at the University by 9:45am and met Mr McCarron by the large clock tower near to the Great Hall. It was saddening that Mr Jones, Head of Science, could not cast ‘judgement’ on our efforts on this day, seeing as how he was the one who had recruited us to this ‘noble’ cause.
The morning began with a word search round and after this we were formally introduced to our hosts and made acquainted with the rules. The most important of these rules was that each team, of which we had separated into three groups of four, had access to a ‘Joker’, which allowed our points to be doubled for that single round. It could be used in any round apart from the final round, which we were told in advance was on ‘Light’.
There were 3 rounds in the morning session. The first round was some general physics knowledge questions, followed by a round in which we had to identify an object from its description. Round three contained a number of mathematical questions which we had to solve. At the end of each round there was a Spot Question for which we had to get the closest answer e.g. what is the mass of the Sun in kilograms?
We were then treated to a lecture by one of the Professors at the University on the subject of using Physics to see inside the human body. Accompanied by some out-dated music, the lecture lasted for around an hour; it was scheduled to last for fifty minutes but was extended due to some mishaps with making a spinning top float using magnetism.
There were 3 further rounds in the afternoon. The first one was to identify famous scientists from a picture or a description. Round 5 was a miscellaneous round, and finally there was the round on the ‘specialist’ area of study – light. One thing we had learned during the quiz was the meaning of L.A.S.E.R. (Light Amplification by the Stimulated Emission of Radiation).
HGS Team B (Aarondeep Johal, Brandon Masih, Ibrahim Kabir and Ranvir Kauldhar) claimed first place. Our prize was a large trophy that the school will return next year and a small trophy that the school will keep. The four winners also each received a gold medal and a model of an internal combustion engine. HGS Team C (Mohammed Khanoie, Kyron Chander-Masaun, Joshua Nagra and Shoaib Raja) won the spot prize about the mass of the Sun (2.0 x 1030 kg) and also came second overall. HGS Team A (Mohammed Hamza Hussain, Arunvir Singh, Raqeeb Khan and Khanh Pham) came joint third with Abingdon School.
On behalf of all of us who participated, I would like to thank Mr Jones, who recruited us, and to Mr McCarron, who was our support in between rounds. I would like to wish Mr Jones good luck in finding people in the current Year 8 who will live up to the standard we set!”
