The only local interschool competition that gives children who’ve always loved to read, a chance to display their knowledge and win prizes for it!

A record twenty-nine teams of students and two teams of staff from Tyne and Wear and Northumberland took part in this year’s Mini Lit Quiz, which is written and produced ‘in house.’

The Quiz is modelled on the Kids Lit Quiz (UK) with both individual and team prizes, but has five rounds instead of ten and its own unique style.  Each round of ten questions follows a particular literary theme but, unlike the KLQ, there is also a Pictionary round featuring picture clues and between-round elimination competitions for cash prizes.

Chantry B and Richard Coates A took an early lead after opting to play their Jokers in the first round, which featured beasts – mini and not-so mini.  However, Dr Thomlinson’s C got the highest score and probably regretted not playing their Joker to double it.

Most teams did very well in the next round, which was all about threes.  Chantry B maintained their early lead but Marden Bridge B snatched the highest scoring round by just half a point from Chantry A and B and Newminster D, who all tied on 9. If Chantry B had played their Joker on this round, it might have clinched the competition for them. Chantry A pushed Richard Coates A into third place.

The Pictionary round has always proved immensely popular and no fewer than nineteen of the thirty one teams competing played their Joker. Unsurprisingly, this really shook things up!  Five teams achieved perfect scores on this round but only Gosforth Central A and Newminster A correctly predicted their strengths and risked their Jokers in what would become a decisive move for one of them.

Newminster A and D shot from nowhere into the first two places, toppling Chantry A and, for the rest of the competition, the placings remained the same.

Round 4 on transport, featuring several titles published within the last year, proved to be surprisingly challenging but Chantry B remained unfazed and held on to their third place.  Newminster A and C tied for highest score, beating Newminster D by half a point.  Newminster C went on to win this round.

The final round on fictional detectives completely floored many teams and, sadly, proved the undoing of some steady performers. Chantry B, however, sailed through unchallenged, securing a very well deserved third place and a book of their choice for each team member.

Newminster A won the competition for the very first time and with the highest score ever achieved in this Quiz – 50 out of a possible 60 points – but nearly every school had at least one team in the top ten positions, which shows how closely matched they were.

HUGE congratulations to our Year 5 team, who would have finished in the top ten if they hadn’t come a cropper on the last round!  We’re expecting great things of you in the future!

Teams that win the top three paces aren’t eligible for a round prize, so the final results are as follows:

First	Newminster A	Round 1	Dr Thomlinson’s C
Second	Newminster D	Round 2	Marden Bridge B
Third	Chantry B	Round 3	St Thomas More B
		Round 4	Newminster C
		Round 5	Newminster B

A very big ‘THANK YOU’ must go yet again to our caretaking, catering and lunchtime supervision teams, who worked so hard to get our hall ready in time for the afternoon’s competition; to our IT staff for their technical expertise and moral support and to student marshals, Lucy and Katie, who stood in the drizzle for half an hour to welcome our visitors and ensure that none of them got lost!  This really was a tremendous team effort!