Hyderabad|India|May'2009: A novel competition "Just Imagine and create your choicest model, a Building Blocks Competition" was organised by Media Junction here in city on Sunday, May 17th at its premises in Musheerabad. Children constructed models with innumerable building blocks and bricks provided at the venue and won prizes. The competition held in two categories 5 to 8 years and 9 to 12 years saw hundred and seven children participating in twelve rounds of forty five minutes duration.

Children unleashed their imagination on hot summer day and built the models using bricks and blocks. Some of the models constructed include "Wow World", "My wonderful Home", "Amusement Park", "The Light House and Beach Resort", "Electrical Power House", "Charminar", "Hi-Tech City", "Hogwarts Castle", "Ship" , "Double Deckor Bus" , "A palace", "Harbor", "White House", "Indian Parliament", "Historical Monuments", "Garden", "An Airport", "Oil Refinery", "Restaurant", "Castle", "Pyramid" and many such interesting models using blocks and bricks. WOW World the model
created by Mayukh Nandula, a 7 years old boy of 3rd class student of Sanskruthi School adjudged as the winner in 5 to 8 years category. The second prize is bagged jointly by Madhav of Hyderabad Public School Ramanthapur for his creation My Home and Garden and Manognya for her model My Garden. In 9 to 12 years category, Ahmed won first prize with his model Amusement Park and Nadia with her model Green Garden won
Second Prize. The panel of judges comprised of a Creative Director of an advertising agency, a montessory teacher and a media professional. The winners will be given away certificate of appreciation and prizes informed D.Kalpana, Director of Media Junction which has organised this unique competition.

Building blocks are nothing but construction toys, they are comprised of interlocking plastic bricks and an accompanying array of minifigures and various other parts. These building blocks and bricks can be assembled and connected in many ways to to construct such objects as vehicles, buildings and even working robots. Anything constructed can then be taken apart again, and the pieces used to make other objects. Bricks, beams,
axles, mini figures, and all other parts when snapped together, the pieces have just the right amount of strength and flexibility mixed together to stick together. They stay together until pulled apart. They cannot be too easy to pull apart, or the resulting constructions would be unstable; they also cannot be too difficult to pull apart, since the disassembly of one creation in order to build another is part of the appeal of the building blocks.

The building blocks competition showed kids the fun of engineering as well as creativity. The competition was fun. It taught children the value of construction. They learnt wow difficult it is to build something. At the same time how easy to destroy or dismantle what is being created, designed.

Many useful lessons were learnt by tiny tots, informed Mrs. Kalpana, organiser of the First Ever Building Blocks Competition. The entry for the competition was free. The organisers provided the building blocks required for the competition. Competition was held on hourly
basis in 12 rounds.

The competition was organised seperately for children between 5 to 8 years old and 9 years to 12 years old. Eight children are allowed to participate in one batch. Each child will given a set of building bocks and they needed to work on them for 45 minutes. The building block pieces were combined to form an object that resembles something in a very abstract way (a person, a bridge, etc.). Later kids were asked to describe their model in thier own words. The individual child decided upon a design, gave it a description (a name). Later the models were voted by the audience and judged by the panel.

Children spent considerable amount of time playing with building blocks. It was by far the most constructive activity for the children. It is found in a survey that world over children spend about 5 billion hours a year playing with building blocks and bricks.

Reachout's News Bureau
 May' 2009