The winners of the IOI-Kids Competitions 2008 received certificates and awards by the president of the International Ocean Institute at a ceremony held on 17 December in the presence of parents and invited guests. The competitions were organised by the IOI-Malta Operational Centre (IOI-MOC) of the University of Malta and challenged primary and secondary school children to combine their artistic and computer talents to prepare attractive and informative electronic contributions in the form of projects and news articles on topics related to the sea. In the words of Dr Aldo Drago, director of IOI-MOC and organiser of the innovative competitions, “the response was formidable with around 300 overall contributions and several high level productions; the main targets were to trigger deeper awareness among school children on topics related to the sea, and to incite our younger generations to experience and voice the beauty, might and yet very vulnerable sea”.
The IOI-Kids Best 2008 Project attracted contributions in the form of essays, notes, poems, stories, powerpoint presentations, videos and web pages treating a wide range of topics on the sea, and garnished with colourful styles and inventive expressions that brought to live the perspectives of the young authors. The junior category (ages five to 10) was won by sisters Maria Josephine and Victoria Vella; Raphael Farrugia, Christian Luke Gatt and David Vella shared second place with equal merit. The youth category (ages 11-16) was won by Ian McLean while Daniel Gauci and Shaun Fenech placed second and third respectively. Kirsten Leanne received the award for originality with her poem, Is It Life or Death for Us, describing the anxiety of a little fish under the threat of fishing gear.
Five very high quality videos were considered. The award was given to a story told by Year 4 pupils of Rabat Primary School B, describing the endeavour of two fish, Mr Goodwiz and Mr Fluffy, to fight sea pollution.
The IOI-Kids Young Journalist Award was given to Martina Vella, a journalist of just five years who wrote about Il-Maghluq and to Manoel Zarb for his superb Fishy! magazine dedicated to fish readers.
The competitions triggered the
enthusiasm of several school teachers with distinctive activities and group productions. The special mermaid IOI-Kids trophy for the best school effort was won by the Rabat Primary School B for their dedicated website put up by Edward Micallef.
These original works, together with other selected contributions, will be published on the IOI-Kids website (www.ioikids.net) and will offer the authors the opportunity to share their projects and efforts with other kids in Malta and worldwide.
The IOI-Kids website is targeted to children, youth, community groups and teachers across the world aiming to share ideas, projects, common issues and experiences with the scope of enhancing knowledge and promoting awareness on the marine environment with the younger generations. IOI-Kids is an innovative outreach interface that uses the internet as a medium and avenue for presenting knowledge on the marine environment in an appealing form, through a learning-through-leisure experience by the use of interactive games and informative featured articles.