Destination States for Six Lakeville students

The Lakeville Call, April 17, 2008

http://www.wickedlocal.com/lakeville/news/x1632298082
By Kristen O'Neil

Who would have thought that a group of children could fit into a television?
That’s exactly what six middle school students from Lakeville did to win the Destination ImagiNation Regional Tournament at Whitman-Hanson High School last month.
Destination ImagiNation (DI) is a community-based, school-friendly process that allows for students across the country to take their knowledge and skills and work cooperatively to apply them in order to solve various challenges in tournaments.
“We competed with teams from Dartmouth, Berkley, and other towns from this area,” Bill Aman, the adult team manager said. “It’s all the kids, all their ideas, all their doing. They have to do everything themselves, I just stand watch and make sure they don’t get hurt.”
The team’s win at the regionals earned them a spot in the State Finals at Worcester Polytech on April 12th.
“This is the third year in a row that we have gotten to the state tournament, these kids are so creative and intelligent, it’s pretty amazing,” Aman said.
In Destination ImagiNation, team members work together to apply creativity, critical thinking and their particular talents to work out a Team Challenge that is solved over a period of eight weeks.
There are five competitive Team Challenges that teams may take part in, each with its own educational focus.
Mr. Aman says that his team only takes part in the structural and architectural design challenge because his son loves to build structures.
“The team is evolving every year because some of the children want to move on to other challenges,” Aman said. “The only challenge Will is interested in is the structure building so kids drop off. Will builds the structures and they critique them and tell him what they need to change.”
For this year’s competition, the team created a giant television with rotating scenery in the background.
Team member Hannah Orall, 12, describes the skit, which takes place in Rwanda and Mongolia, and exactly what goes on inside that giant television.
“Our skit is about gorillas and snow leopards. We’re trying to find them and we tell people about why they’re endangered,” she said. “Our car breaks down, then Will brings out the structure and that’s where the ‘switch’ comes in.”
“We have to utilize tools throughout, and we use a mirror to first look at the gorillas behind us and then at the end we flash a mirror at helicopters to come and rescue us.”
Bill Aman is the father of two members of the team, Katrina, 13, and Will, 11, and says that he was informed about Destination ImagiNation through the kids’ elementary school about six years ago.
“A notice came home and there was an informational meeting. I went to it and the first thing you need is adult team managers,” he said. “So another parent and I co-managed a team and from there I kind of inherited it.”
This year’s Lakeville team is made up of six students, three of which attend Freetown-Lakeville Middle School, Katrina and Will Aman, and Audrey Dors, 14.
Hannah Orrall, 12, and Ethan Orrall, 10, are home schooled and Alex Lawton, 11, attends a private school in Acushnet.
Eighth-grader Audry Dors has been involved in DI since elementary school.
“I started doing this in first grade after my older sisters started doing it,” she said. “I do it because it’s fun and it makes you think.”
Dors and Katrina Aman have been on the same team for six years, since Aman joined in third grade.
“It seemed interesting from what my parents told me after they went to the meeting,” Katrina said. “It’s more of a team than other activities you can do after school, and you get to create things which make it even better.”
Fifth grader Alex Lawton, says that he found out about the program through the Dors’ mother.
“She told my mom about it and I tried it and I liked it,” he said. “I like it better this year because we’re actually building things with wood and tools, not just cardboard paper.”
According to the DI website, the Team Challenge consists of three parts: the Central Challenge, Side Trips, and the Instant Challenge.
The television skit is The Central Challenge for the Lakeville team, with the Side Trips used as an extra element that showcases any additional talents that the group may want to explore.
In the Instant Challenge, students are asked to think on their feet in order to solve an impromptu problem in a very short amount of time- usually in five to eight minutes.
Audry’s sister, Valerie, 17, has been involved in Destination ImagiNation for 12 years, and now assists Bill Aman and his team.
“In an Instant Challenge we did a couple of years ago they gave us chairs and some sticks and we had to create a way to roll balls across them. In another one they turned out the lights and everyone had to freeze and perform as if there was no power.”
Tournaments are a celebration of what the team has accomplished and what they have learned.
Teams are rewarded based on the process that they have experienced and special awards are given for exceptional creativity, teamwork, and innovation.
For this team, each member brings something valuable to the table.
“Will is the builder, and Katrina’s an artist,” Aman said. “One girl can write any script you want, the other three fill in where needed, with great artwork, writing, and great acting,” he said. “The most important thing is the ideas, though. They’ll throw out 10 ideas to get to one great one.”
One part of a challenge that the team enjoys is called “Switch,” where structures are incorporated into the skit and are tested by putting more and more weight upon them until they collapse.
For this year’s Challenge, the team created a thin, small, wooden structure that held up 90 pounds in one direction and 65 pounds in another.
“It’s more than just putting the structure into a skit, they put it into the tester and stack weights on it,” Will Aman said. “Then they record the weight and you switch the orientation, and do it again until the structure collapses or you run out of time. You get certain bonuses from combining the weights.”
“It’s pretty complicated, you have two minutes to stack and restack and reverse the direction of the structure,” Bill Aman said. “For last year’s challenge, Will came up with a cylindrical shape made up of a deck of cards around some metal, and it held up 400 pounds.”
Today, Aman says, the kids are working on cutting down the size of their television to fit into the smaller lecture hall at Worcester Polytech, and figuring out why the wooden structure collapsed.
“There were no size restrictions at the Regionals because it was held in a gym, so we need to cut the TV down length and height wise,” Aman said. “Along with cleaning up the script and understanding why the structure collapsed.”
There are no power tools allowed, and the set the team built is made up of hinges so that they can take it down and put it back up using only hammers and screwdrivers.
The kids gather together on a Friday afternoon to practice and work on their structure at the Amans’ house inside a giant backyard playhouse in the woods.
As they lift the cloth background and try to hang it, laughter fills the air, but also determination.
“These kids can be really disciplined,” Aman said. “They just know when to crack down and get the work done, and they really enjoy being with each other.”
After the States, the top two teams from Massachusetts in each challenge go to the Globals in May to compete against teams from all over the country, a fete that one team from Lakeville accomplished three years ago.
The Destination ImagiNation website has a countdown to the Globals, which are being held at Thompson-Boling Arena at the University of Tennesee Knoxville on May 21- 24 this year.
“Massachusetts has some of the best teams and is extremely competitive,” Aman said. “These are some of the most sought after kids out of college because they are so creative and involved. It’s impressive to see what kids are capable of at such a young age.”
For more information on Destination ImagiNation, visit the program website at http://www.idodi.org/.
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