Parents and Teachers: Battle of the Books

Battle of the Books is a challenging annual competition which tests local elementary students' knowledge of books and authors. All Barrie and Oro-Medonte schools are invited to join the Battle of the Books challenge in the fall.

A booklist, from which all of the questions will be written, is distributed to all Barrie and Oro-Medonte elementary schools in the fall. Teams prepare for the battles from the fall to early spring. The Battle of the Books takes place at the Barrie Public Library in late April/early May.

The 2010 Battle of the Books will take place at the Barrie Public Library from April 26th – 30th. The Grand Battle will be held at the Council Chambers at City Hall on Friday April 30th at 7:00 p.m.

Teams of up to twelve students, from grades four through eight, compete by answering questions about books and authors in 6 different categories.

The categories are: Canadian Birch, Canadian Maple, Classics, Fairytales and Folklore, Fun and Fantasy and Award Winning.

Basic rules of play:

• Round robin play between two teams at a time
• Up to 8 team players may play each battle
• Each team plays at least three battles, against a different team each time
• Each team has 30 seconds in which to provide the answer to the question
• Both title of the book and the author's last name are required for a correct answer
• Points are awarded for each correct answer
• Opposing team can score bonus points by correctly answering a question which the other team has missed
• Cumulative scores are kept for each team
• A minimum of four teams with the highest cumulative scores will be invited to a Grand Battle evening to play for the trophy
• The winning school gets to keep the trophy at their school until the next year's semi-battles

If you require any additional information on Barrie Public Library's Battle of the Books competition, please call the Manager of Children's and Youth Services at (705) 728-1010 ext. 7017 or e-mail jsalmon@city.barrie.on.ca.