INSTANT CHALLENGE NET is your entrance to a huge network of resources to keep you and your team sharp with Intant Challenge after Instant Challenge. We have scoured both the internet and old paper files alike to create the resource of resources to keep young minds sharp.

Destination ImagiNation is a problem solving competition for young people from kindergarten through college. Teams work on Team Challenges and Instant Challenges. The team challenges develop sustained problem solving while Instant Challenges provide an opportunity for rapid-fire problem solving.

Instant Challenges provide a chance for a team to show off it's creative problem solving skills in short, unrehearsed presentations. Although each Instant Challenge has different requirements, all Instant Challenges reward teams for teamwork, uniqueness, and creativity of the team's solution.

Instant Challenges are between five and ten minutes in length and are one of two types - Performance based or Task Based.

Don't leave them to be done if there is time. Make time for them in your meeting schedule or have Instant Challenge Meetings. They can help warm up teams before working on their solutions for the main challenge, provide a way to break up a team meeting, or be a means to try out hypotheses teams have brainstormed as possible solutions to the main challenges. Instant Challenge Competition can often make or break a team at a tournament. It can separate a team that has learned to work well together from a team that never practiced team building skills.

Performance-Based Instant Challenges require teams to create a performance from real or imaginary props. The team must either create these props from given materials or use ones already provided. The type of presentation for these Instant Challenges will vary. They may include one or more of the following: singing, miming, rhyming, dancing, etc. Team members may enhance their characterizations through the use of Improv, Mime, Body Language, Stage Presence, and/or Voice Alteration. When brainstorming a solution to a performance-based instant challenge, teams should make sure they consider areas of Story Line Development such as: Situation, Conflict, Resolution, and Beginning-Middle-End. They may also want to think about using other theatrical elements including: Staging, Music, and Special Effects

Task-Based Instant Challenges are more hands-on type challenges. Team members must work together to communicate, move, change or protect something with the materials they are given by the Appraisers. Sometimes they will be given items which they must manipulate and then give related verbal responses about what they have done with them for score. In a Task-Based Instant Challenge the team will be given a variety of materials to use to solve the challenge. These materials will fall into three main categories: Extenders/Structural Items; Connectors/Adhesives; and Controllers/Holders/Transporters. When beginning task-based Instant Challenges it is recommended that you first discuss the three basic types of materials with your team. Then gather a wide variety of items from the lists below and have your team determine what the function(s) of each item might be. Remember keep asking the team in what ways could they use each item. Have them make a chart of the functions of the various items.

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