AstroQuiz®

AstroQuiz
The AstroQuiz™ Competition is an Astronomy focused questions and answers competition for teams of learners. Initially founded in 2005 at Sci-Bono Discovery Centre, during the National Astronomy Platform month, the competition enjoyed almost instant success and was subsequently established as a fixed annual competition that gained a national footprint. The objective of this competition is to contribute to the improvement of awareness, interest, understanding, and insight into basic astronomy as well as build an appreciation of pride within South Africa’s history of science activity and achievements, amongst others.

CLOSING DATE : 31 March 2024
Enrolment Form

The AstroQuiz is coordinated by the Science Education Division at the South African Agency for Science and Technology Advancement (SAASTA); a business unit of the National Research Foundation.

Grade 7 learners from schools based in South Africa.

Educators must enter their learners (teams of four learners, except in round 1 where educators are allowed to enroll all grade 7 learners) on the provided registration form 

ROUND

LEVEL

FORMAT

DATE

1

School

Written (pen & paper)

Thursday, 11 April

2

District

Online

Thursday, 16 May

3

Provincial

Online

Thursday, 11 July

4

National

Online

Thursday, 8 August

  • • Each team consists of four (4) learners (no less, no more)
    • Entry is free
    • Schools enroll via an enrolment form (attached) for round 1.
    • No school is allowed to skip a round.
    • All schools must submit their results before being allowed to enroll for round 2.
    • Round 1 will be paper-based and written at respective school
    • Rounds 2 to 4 will be online.
    • Each round consist of 30 multiple choice questions
    • The top three teams in the provincial round as well as the top three in the national round stand to win prizes.

Thursday, 11 April 2024

  1. The educator has the choice to either not restrict the number of grade 7 learners taking the quiz, i.e. enrol as many grade 7 learners as you wish or may select 1 to 2 teams of four members each at this stage.
  2. The paper will be emailed to all educators who registered by the closing date.
  3. All grade 7 learners are allowed to participate at the school.
  4. Once the quiz has been written, the educator provides NRF-SAASTA with the results on the template, which the educator will receive together with the paper.
  5. Learners have 30 minutes to complete the round
  6. The educator decides/selects which team or teams (maximum two teams) he/she would like to enrol for round 2.

Thursday, 16 May 2024  

Rounds 2 to 4 take place online and each educator who sends their results of round 1 to NRF-SAASTA will receive the link to register their team(s). A maximum of two teams per school will be allowed in round 2.

  1. Teams compete within a school district.
  2. The top three (3) per educational district proceed to the provincial
  3. Time: teams have 30 min to complete the quiz
  4. Should there be ties between the top three (3) schools in a municipal district in round 2, the tied teams will be allowed to proceed to round 3.
  5. Should there be a tie between the two teams from the same school, they will be given a tie-breaker test to determine which team will proceed to round 3. If, after the tie breaker, the teams are still in a tie, NRF-SAASTA will look at the time it took the teams to complete the original online quiz for round 2 to distinguish the winner.  The team who completed the original online quiz in the fastest time, will be the winner of the tie and proceed to the next round

Thursday, 11 July 2024  

  1. Teams compete with the winning teams of all municipal districts in their respective provinces.
  2. Teams compete for the top three positions in the province.
  3. Time: teams have 30 min to complete the quiz
  4. The wining team proceeds to represent the province in the national round, i.e. round 4.
  5. Teams who are in a tie with one another for the top three positions in their province will be expected to write a tie-breaker test. If, after the tie breaker, the teams are still in a tie, NRF-SAASTA will look at the time it took the teams to complete the original online quiz for round 3 to distinguish the winner.

Thursday, 8 August 2024

  1. Teams compete for the top three national positions
  2. Time: teams have 30 min to complete the quiz
  3. If there are teams who are in a tie with one another for the top three positions, the team who finished in the fastest time will be the winner. There will be no tie-breakers.
  1.  All rounds consist of multiple-choice questionnaires.
  2. Round 1 consists of 30 questions and learners are allowed 30 minutes (one minute per question) to complete this round.
  3. Rounds 2- 4 consists of 40 questions and teams are allowed 80 minutes (two minutes per question) to complete the online quiz. Ten of the 40 questions are used in the case of a tie to determine the winning teams who will go through to the next round. On average the data that will be needed should not be more than the cost of sending 4-5 WhatsApp messages to complete each quiz.
  1. The top three teams in the provincial round as well as the top three teams in the national round stand to win prizes.
  2. All learners will receive electronic participation certificates.

Download Past Papers

Contact us

Ms. Zinzi Madiope

Email: astro@saasta.ac.za

Ms. Erna Taljaard

Email: astro@saasta.ac.za