Falmouth DI teams take First Place

Falmouth team members from the and schools are celebrating this week. Both teams received First Place for their performances when they participated at the Cape and Islands Regional D.I. Tournament last Saturday, March 12, at Dennis-Yarmouth High School.

Destination Imagination is an organization that awards teams of school students for creativity, team work and problem solving. The teams begin the season by choosing one of seven challenges, all with a clear guideline of what is expected and what they can and cannot do during their performance. The challenges range from fine arts to structural to scientific, and all but one challenge incorporate creativity and problem-solving in the form of a performance. 

 The Falmouth Morse Pond team consisted of 5th graders Sara Goulart, Brian Estes, Kevin Peters, Taylor Gonsalves, Zack Bowerman, Hale Thomas and Matthew Liebkemann. They competed together at the elementary level in the "Mythology Mission" improvisation challenge. 

For the challenge, the team chose six different countries from a list of twelve options. To prepare for their challenge, the team had to study each country to learn about a culture and a mythological creature from that country.

At the tournament, the team pulled a number, which told them which country/culture/mythological creature they were to use as the foundation of their five minute performance.  

The team was then given three items they needed to creatively incorporate into the skit, and they also encountered an unexpected problem that was introduced to them during the skit. It was a challenging task, and the team was selected as the best of the four competing teams in their challenge at the elementary level.  The team has been together for 5 years and is managed by Rob Bowerman and Deb Thomas.

The Grade 7 Lawrence team consisted of  Kit Palmer, Emma Driscoll, Krystine Carley, Anna Ragonese and Marissa Genduso. Their team won first place performing in the "Triple Take Road Show" fine arts challenge at the middle school level.

For this challenge, the team needed to use three different storytelling methods to tell the same story to three team-chosen pretend audiences; portray two different travel methods used to move their road show between each pretend audience; plus introduce a team-created technical spectacle into one of the presentations —all this in an eight minute skit. The team is managed by Laura Ragonese. 

Both teams will next compete at the State Destination Imagination Tournament, which will be held on March 26 at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute.