Wort chilling and root beer questions

[airborne spoon]

So I have only brewed one batch of beer and when I was chilling the wort I was stirring the wort with the chiller. Is this an ok thing to do? I mean it went from 212 down to 74 in about 6-7 min.
Also i am making root beer no alcohol should i still boil it for an hour then chill it or just boil it and then chill to keg it? Also i am doing an extract, but the next time i will make it from scratch with roots and stuff. any advice is appreciated.

 

[Ozarks Mountain Brewery]

yes you can stir while chilling and you only boil root beer for a minute to dissolve the sugar and you can chill in the keg it's fine

 

[Hogarthe]

You don't need to boil root beer for an hour. Just a few minutes to make sure any microbes are killed off and the water is hot enough to dissolve the sugar and stuff. With actual roots I'd probably boil 10-15 minutes to make sure it's sanitary and the flavor is extracted. Stirring while chilling is good, it won't hurt it and cools it down much faster