Meetings

Team Meetings

Please plan to meet with your team monthly. Regular meetings to review the books help keep the team on track to be ready for the Final Battle in April.  After school meetings should be scheduled for 45 minutes to 1 hour. Please remember to have a copy of your team's emergency contact information available when meeting with your team AND remind parents to fill out the dismissal form on the Alden School website about the change in dismissal plans for an after school Battle of the Books meeting. 

TEAM LEADERS - Please fill out this required form prior to the kick off meeting indicating if you will have team meetings at Alden School or another location.

MEETING AT ALDEN SCHOOL
To help with the dismissal of students and communication with families, Alden School has offered to reserve space at the school for team meetings on the following days for all teams. These dates will be posted once teams have been assigned.

5th  Grade - TBD
4th Grade -  TBD
3rd Grade - TBD

Teams will meet in the lobby at dismissal and be directed to their space for each meeting. If you choose this option, your team will meet on all four assigned dates at Alden School. You are welcome to schedule additional meetings with your team but the school will expect your team to meet at Alden on these pre-scheduled days. If your team needs to miss a meeting at Alden School, please email Ms. McEvoy-Duane at mmcevoyduane@duxbury.k12.ma.us prior to your meeting day so she will not reserve a space for your team on that day.

ALTERNATE MEETING LOCATIONS
You are welcome to meet at another location if meeting at Alden School with the above schedule doesn't work for your team. For after school meetings, the Duxbury Free Library meeting rooms can be reserved online approximately two months in advance HERE. Another option is to meet at a Team Leader's house  or another central location over the weekend. Please communicate with your team about meeting location, meeting schedule and directions where to pick up students at the end of each meeting.

Meeting Activities

There are so many options when it comes to organizing monthly meetings with your team.  We've included some ideas to help you get started.   

• Start with an icebreaker or quick game.  

• To begin the book discussion, ask students to give a brief description of the book they read. Would they recommend it to another student? Why or why not?

• Print off the questions provided under the grade level tab to help direct the book discussion.  (You don't need to read the books!)

• If you are meeting after school, consider bringing water and a small snack for the students to enjoy before starting the meeting.  

• Add in a fun activity!  Some groups like to only discuss the book while others like an activity to break up the time together. See below for ideas.
  
  

Kahoot - www.kahoot.com

Kahoot allows you to create online quizzes to share with your teams, for free.  It’s easy to set up and you can create quizzes ranging from general literary questions to specific questions if you have read a book as a group. Many books already have a Kahoot set up! It’s a lot of fun!

Quizlet - https://quizlet.com

Quizlet has study guides and quizzes available on many BoB titles.  

Roll & Retell
Team leaders can roll dice and ask team members to answer a corresponding question about the book.  

More information on setting up virtual and in-person book clubs:

• https://www.edutopia.org/article/how-set-virtual-book-club-students

• https://www.scholastic.com/parents/family-life/parent-child/start-book-club-kids.html

• https://www.parents.com/fun/entertainment/books/how-to-start-a-kids-book-club/

Meeting Icebreakers

Alphabet Name
Example: My name is Apple Anna, Bobby Banana. Students introduce themselves with a word that also shares the same first letter as their first name. Other students then have to repeat the name and the word of each preceding student as they introduce themselves.

My Favorite
This icebreaker is simple enough: Students simply identify something that’s ‘their favorite.’ ("My favorite kind of book to read is.. "‘My favorite pizza topping is…’ or, ‘My favorite game to play with friends is…)

Pick a Superpower
If they had a superpower what would it be?

On-the-Spot Story

Get those creative juices flowing! Sit with a small group and spend 10 minutes creating a story on the spot. Each person contributes one sentence of the story, and the only rules (aside from only adding appropriate content) is that the story must continue for the allotted amount of time. The story can be silly, adventurous, or go wherever kids’ imaginations take them! 

Would You Rather
Ask questions to get the students talking. Ask them to make up their own!
Would you rather play sports or watch them?
Would you rather be part of the Incredibles family or the Weasley family?
Would you rather live in a world of legos or a world of cartoons?
Would you rather have a pet dinosaur or a pet dragon?
Would you rather live in a house made of cheese or a house made of cookie dough?
Would you rather be a mouse or an elephant?
Would you rather be invisible or be able to fly?
Would you rather live at Disney World or Sea World?