By Nicholas Cortese, ’23:
The Language Clubs, faculty, and students hosted a Language Week Kahoot! on Thursday, March 4.
After the chaos of several pulse-pounding lead changes concluded, the top three Kahoot! contestants finished with impressive scores. Sophomore Nicholas Canny answered the most correct at 38 out of 40, however finished third place because Kahoot!’s placing system also factors in competitors’ answering speed. Freshman Paulina Barnjak showed off her speed as she finished second despite answering three less than Nick at 35. But Paulina’s sister, freshman Gabby Barnajak displayed a victorious combination of speed and accuracy in her Language Week Challenge triumph.
The Kahoot! event was presented by Miss LaMonica, Mrs. Cameron, Miss Vogel, Mrs. Arias, and all the other language teachers.
There were forty questions total. The first ten were based on Spanish. Some questions that stumped a bunch of the contestants were about how many languages are spoken in Spain and where the former New York Yankee, Mariano Rivera, was born. If you were wondering, the corresponding answers for those questions are five and Panama.
The next section was on French culture. There were questions that asked about translations such as “Je mange du fromage,” which means “I eat some cheese,” and “Ferme la fenêtre,” which in English is “Close the window.”
Starting the second half of this Kahoot! was Latin content. While there were once again many translation questions, some other ones were about Horace coining the famous phrase “Carpe Diem” and the letter W not existing in the language.
Finally, students answered questions on both American Sign Language and miscellaneous questions. This section offered more of a challenge since much fewer students are familiar with ASL than the other three. The miscellaneous feature also added a cliffhanger aspect to the quiz. This was an even bigger deal than the last part because it meant the winner would come down to the wire. Questions like “Who is the patron Saint of the hearing impaired?” and “What language family does English belong to?” were tough to many participants. While these answers were set and stone at St Francis de Sales and Germanic respectively, the leaderboards were anything but set and the victory was up for grabs.
This event was extremely successful and fun for everyone involved. The Kahoot! will definitely be continued in the future as it gets kids involved the most.
As is tradition during Language Week, morning prayers were recited in various languages and hallway displays exhibited the linguistic culture at Kellenberg.
Language Week only comes around once a school year. That means, for most students, they only get to witness its festivities 3-7 times total. Despite this, language week has been and continues to be a memorable and essential part of everyone’s time at Kellenberg.