The Battle of the Books

This morning, Jon and I made the trek down to the South Side to volunteer at the Chicago Public Schools Elementary Battle of the Books. I wish I would have had the opportunity to participate in something like this as a child -- it's exactly the type of nerd competition I would have excelled at. Each school sends a team of 4-6 kids to answer questions about 20 books from the Battle of the Books reading list. It's kind of like the spelling bee, where the questions get more difficult as the contest progresses. And then the top teams compete for glory in the finals. Here's the link to the wiki page if you want to find out more:

http://cpslibraries.wikispaces.com/ElementaryBattleoftheBooks

Our friends Laura, Ryan, Leslie, and Ashley have volunteered before and got to be judges, but Jon and I were newbies and didn't read any of the books, so we were given the simple task of "timekeeper/scorekeeper." Basically, that meant monitoring the stopwatch to make sure questions were answered within 45 seconds and then marking down a score of either 0 (wrong answer), 5 (right answer), or 7 (right answer and author name).

 Me, Jon, Laura, and Ryan

The kids in action during round 2 -- Ashley was the judge in my classroom

It was a really fun day -- the kids were adorable and really excited about the competition. I definitely plan on volunteering again next year, though I will make sure to read a few of the books so I can participate as a judge and chat with the kids about what they've read. Speaking of which, The Hunger Games, by Suzanne Collins, seemed to be the overwhelming favorite. I know it's for young adults, but I think I may have to check it out next time I make a library run!