Regional Results

Our team, The Venomous Vipers, scored higher than 22 other teams to come in second place! 

We never expected to do so well, especially since we were competing against the Gifted and Talented programs from all the area schools. Our team was the only non-school-affiliated team, and had less access to resources for our projects. We were an independent team made up of students from 3 separate schools and one home school student.  

I'm so proud of how they did in all areas of the competition!

Here are some snippets of our long day at the tournament:

During our morning pep talk, we agreed that no matter what the judges thought, they were winners because they did their absolute best. I pulled out some blue-ribbon medals I had ordered for the team and passed them out. The children were so delighted! They tucked the medals under their shirts as a good luck token and wore them all day. 

The picture below is the finished backdrop for CandyLand. The team designed it so the clouds are cotton candy, the trees are lollipops, and the mountains are topped with ice cream and peanut brittle.  The judges really loved this part of the project!

Here the team is interviewed by a judge before they go onstage for their performance. They were questioned about all their creations (mostly to see if the kids REALLY made it all themselves.)

Here they wait in the Launching Area for the judges signal to begin. 

Here is a shot of the performance in action. Actually, I thought I was videotaping it. I wasn't. Drat! I pushed the wrong button and missed recording almost the entire play! 

Here is Lydia, the rat character. 

After the performance, the judges come onstage to ask the kids questions about their work. 

Whose idea was this?

How did you make it?

How did you learn  how to do this?

Lydia was our seamstress all year, and the judges were floored by her contributions. They had a hard time believing she sewed everything (she even made her own pattern for the witch costume!). 

The judges also really loved Thomas' kinetic art that was used by the character Death. He spent weeks making it. The judges asked incredulously how he was able to cut through all the metal, and he said matter-of-factly: A knife. The slits of metal were then folded together to make wind-catchers. Thomas spent weeks on it. When the judges expressed disbelief that a child could make this, Thomas proudly told them how many band-aids he had to wear after making this project. 

He had two judges enthralled for several  minutes as they inspected his careful work.

Here is a shot of the unicorn costume the team built together.

The kids had wanted a team prayer before going onstage, so we huddled and prayed in the crowded hallway. I tribute our success to that prayer. 

You see, when we practiced our script on the long drive to the tournament, kids consistently forgot their lines. We  never made it through the script without memory problems. Then they discussed several changes they wanted to make. We didn't have time to rehearse again at the school, but they NAILED it perfectly! 

I was beaming and trying not to giggle while I observed the entire performance. They did WAY better than I've ever seen! They knew they did an exceptional job and were literally dancing in glee afterwards, exclaiming, "I LOVED performing! I LOVE DI!"

After their successful performance for the judges, team dad Jaun Mendoza treated the entire team to cotton candy. They were SO excited and wanted a team picture together with their treats.

After a quick lunch, we started warming up our minds for the next part of the competition: the Instant Challenge. These are short challenges that a team must solve by working together to accomplish a certain task. It requires creativity, usually some engineering skill, high levels of communication, and exceptional teamwork. 

This part of the competition is tricky, since you have  no idea what type of challenge you will be given by the judges. Will you be building a tower out of index cards? Performing a commercial with ping pong balls and pirates? Writing an original song about the worlds best toothbrush?

It's a little bit stressful since you only have 4 minutes to finish the challenge, so teams work all year on conflict resolution skills to deal with this.

We practice different challenges all year at team meetings so they can learn skills to use in the competition.

I was worried about this portion since our team had never successfully completed a challenge during our practices. They always required a second attempt in order to complete the tasks. 

Here they work on a challenge during our break time:

When we did some warm-up challenges during lunchtime, our team totally fell apart. They argued and hurt each others feelings, then failed to do the task they were given. The team was falling apart, and I realized they needed to go run outside to burn off some stress hormones. I challenged them all to a big race and we played and played. After enjoying the outdoors, I called them together for a pep talk, reminding them how well they did in their performance and pointing out they had a strong score.  They were STILL angry. Erg. I explained that I had done everything I could to help them be friends. I failed as a coach if they were fighting. 

After a thoughtful silence, I said, "Do you think Heavenly Father is proud of the way you performed for the judges earlier? Yes, He is. Do you think He wants you to succeed? I think so. Do you think He has power to change your hearts to remove the anger and replace it with love and teamwork? Yes he does! What can we do to invite His help right now?"

The team huddled for a group prayer and the children took turns praying, asking the Lord to remove their contentious feelings. Then it was time for us to compete our Instant Challenge.

It truly was a miracle. 

They worked together in a way I've never seen them do before. They were amazingly organized and had clear minds to quickly solve the challenge (they even finished BEFORE time was up!). They nailed it, and they knew it. 

While waiting for the day to end and the awards ceremony to begin, we headed out for a quick dinner. 

The awards ceremony was a giant party, with hundreds of kids dancing to the music and having a great time.

After our successful awards ceremony, we stopped for ice cream to celebrate our victory.

Yesterday we received the good news that our team was advanced to the state competition!

The kids are ecstatic.

I'm shocked and excited.

I thought the chapter of DI was closing for the year, but now we have a month to improve for the state level. 

I'm cancelling my plans for a quiet Spring Break this week with my family.

Instead, I have 18 hours of team meetings this week to improve our projects.

We also started some fundraisers to help pay for the state registration fees. 

The kids are working hard cleaning houses in our neighborhood and doing yard work to raise money. We have other activities in the works as well- garage sales, bake sales, etc.

Want to help? Every dollar counts!

Check out one way you can help the team HERE. 

I'll love you forever if you do. (Well, I'll still love you even if you don't.)

If you don't see me much on the blogosphere, now you know why. I'll be elbow-deep in DI kids at least two days a week, and knee-deep in paperwork for the state competition.

What about my housework? We'll just pretend my dirty kitchen doesn't exist, mkay?