ESC hosts county’s first Math Pong tournament

Published 5:00 am Sunday, December 22, 2024

On Monday, 128 fourth and fifth graders from eight elementary schools across Lawrence County came together to face off in the field of mathematics.

The Lawrence County ESC hosted its first ever county-wide Math Pong tournament at Ohio University Southern, awarding honors to both individual winners, as well as classes.

Andy Lovejoy, gifted supervisor for the ESC, said the video game competition had tournaments last year for Burlington and Chesapeake, but this was the first time all the schools were brought together in one building to compete.

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Lovejoy said the game was focused on multiplication facts and rapid recall.

“It’s a fun and engaging was to promote basic math fluency,” he said.

He said individual schools hosted tournaments and then teams were formed with the top eight students in each grade at a school.

The Mains Rotunda at the university was loud that morning as the cheers of the students echoed off the walls for the matches, which took place over three hours.

When all was settled, Rock Hill won as the fourth grade champions, while Fairland took the fifth grade title.

In individual student matches, Gabe Dyer, of Rock Hill won as fourth grade champion, while Joseph Keffer, of Chesapeake, won the fifth grade matches. For Keffer, it was a second consecutive week of victory in an ESC event. He won first place in the Lawrence County Spelling Bee on Dec. 9.