Combining Teacher Training and Quiz Night

 Last night, our church fielded a team in the local inter-church quiz.  I should probably have been preparing lessons, but instead, I joined.  This quiz has been running for many years and has become a hotly-contested event involving around twenty teams.

"But it’s a church thing", you say, "– surely it can’t be that competitive?"

You’re right, “competitive” is not the word – “internecine” would be better.

And it didn’t look good – there were only six of us rather than the recommended eight, and a couple who had young children to get to bed didn’t even arrive until round two.  But, two of our team members were teachers and recited the classroom mantras,

“Let’s just do our very best,” and “It’s not the winning, but the taking part that counts.”

When hovering between two answers, we were asked to consider “What are the examiners hoping we will put?”

And we were encouraged always to “put something rather than nothing, because you can’t get a mark if you don’t put anything.”

By the end of the evening, I felt I’d received a workshop in good classroom practice.

And the result – we came a creditable third.

Even better, because of our skills in analysing pupil data, we were able to work out that we scored more per person than the winning team!

(Bad losers? Us?)