Weekly Updates
Weekly Updates
Embedded Files
Friday, December 5th
Congratulations Jack, Josephine, Andes, and Maya on finishing all 10 books! 🎉
Battlers were working hard over the break! We now have six (6) finishers for the 3rd/4th grade team and our first two (2) finishers for 5th/6th! AND almost every student finished at least one book over the break! So proud of how hard everyone is working.
Practice sets are now available! Please be sure to complete two practice sets each week in lieu of question writing.
Battlers - Once you have completed at least 8 of the 10 books, please complete this form to let me know the books you want to be an expert on. In theory, we want you to complete all books prior to choosing experts, but we are getting close to battle season and we need to be able to get students focused on specific books. **Even if you are assigned as an expert, you MUST complete all 10 books first.**
What does it mean to be an expert?
You will read and reread your expert books as many times as possible.
In the huddles, you are the go-to person for that book and will provide insight if there is a question regarding your expert book.
Every student will be an expert on at least two books.
You gain access to the coach's question bank for your books, which you are expected to review throughout the season.
You will review and contribute to the Matched Themes workbook for your expert books.
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Below is a list of items students need to check off the list this week prior to practice:
Read, read, read (and fill in the Matched Themes workbooks as you go)
Complete the weekly check in form (either Monday or Tuesday)
Complete two (2) practice sets each week (practice sets are now available!)
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Tuesday, December 2nd
IMPORTANT UPDATE:
Just a quick reminder regarding weather, if school is delayed, Battle of the Books is cancelled.
Additionally, I am missing t-shirt sizes for several battlers. Please fill out this form as soon as possible letting us know what size to order for your kiddo. Any student that does not have a form filled out by 12/3 will be receiving a Youth Large t-shirt.
Fingers crossed we will see you tomorrow!
Wednesday, November 19th
T-shirt colors have been chosen! Below are the colors for each team (keep scrolling down). Please fill out this form no later than Wednesday, December 3rd to let us know what size your child needs. Any student that does not have a form filled out by 12/3 will be receiving a Youth Large t-shirt.
Students came home with a TENTATIVE Battle Schedule (it is a hard copy). Let's go ahead and pencil these dates in. I did receive confirmation we are on Tuesdays, so I am assuming if there are any changes, they would be minor (i.e. time of battle). If you see any initial conflicts, please reach out as soon as possible. This will help us immensely when we begin to think about battle line ups.
🚩🚩EXCITING UPDATE🚩🚩
We should have questions written for all of the books by the end of the month! 🎉 This allows for an exciting transition for the students. Instead of writing 10 questions before each practice, they will now complete practice question sets before practice.
The first practice question sets are available NOW!
Practice sets consist of 10 questions and should take students no more than 10 minutes for each set.
We only have 30 seconds to answer each question if we are the receiving team in a battle, so students should not be spending more than 30 seconds on each question. They will type the title (spelling does not matter) in the form for each question.
Tickets will be given for every practice set completed (as long as an effort has been made).
If a student answers with a question mark (?), "I don't know", "idk", leaves it blank, etc, they will not earn a ticket for the set. Students can take the sets as many times as they want.
A minimum of two (2) practice sets will be published each week.
📅📅IMPORTANT DATES📅📅
MOCK BATTLE: Wednesday, January 7th (arrive at 7:15 a.m.)
The DCL librarians will be coming in and putting on a mock battle for the students! Please be sure to have your student at practice early on this day.
TENTATIVE BATTLE SCHEDULE:
*The link to the schedule is linked directly to the DCL Battle of the Books website and will update automatically with any changes.
Have a great break! 🦃🦃🦃🦃🦃🦃🦃
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Below is a list of items students need to check off the list this week prior to practice:
Read, read, read (and fill in the Matched Themes workbooks as you go)
Complete the weekly check in form (either Monday or Tuesday)
Complete two (2) practice sets each week (practice sets are now available!)
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3rd/4th - Violet
5th/6th - Light Pink
Wednesday, November 12th
Battlers are mastering authors and titles! Great job! This is crucial to our success in the battles. We are in full blown practice mode at this point, with our main emphasis on getting through as many practice sets as we can each week. While going through practice sets we will discuss strategy and work on problem solving techniques to help our speaker make the best book choice for each given situation. We are talking about challenges, steals, battle conduct, and preparation strategies too! Lots of great work happening. Thanks for getting your kids there each week. They are happy, excited, and participating, which is all a coach can ask for!
🚩🚩SAVE THE DATES!🚩🚩
MOCK BATTLE: Wednesday, January 7th (arrive at 7:15 a.m.)
The DCL librarians will be coming in and putting on a mock battle for the students! Please be sure to have your student at practice early on this day.
TENTATIVE BATTLE SCHEDULE:
*I did some sleuthing and can see a battle schedule up (which is linked above). Let's go ahead and pencil these dates in, but don't move anything around just yet. I want to hear from the library that these schedules are finalized before people make any changes to schedules due to conflicts. For background, last year they released a version of the schedule and then changed it after some of us went out of our way to clear schedule conflicts. To avoid this inconvenience, I will reach out once I get word that things are set.
**If you see any initial conflicts on the initial schedule please reach out as soon as possible. This will help us immensely when we begin to think about battle line ups.
See everyone next week!
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Below is a list of items students need to check off the list this week prior to practice:
Read, read, read (and fill in the Matched Themes workbooks as you go)
Complete the weekly check in form (either Monday or Tuesday)
Write 10 questions (links to the question bank are found here)
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Wednesday, October 29th
Congratulations Danny on finishing all 10 books! 🎉
We had a great practice today! Our practice sets are going well, definitely more right than wrong, and we had our first challenge today! Next week, we will walk through the challenge process and we get to see if we "win" the challenge. Very exciting!
Keep practicing those authors and titles! We are heads down working on practice sets, so the sooner we have those authors and titles down the better!
Don't forget to request access to the MATCHED THEMES WORKBOOK - Request access now!
See everyone next week!
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Below is a list of items students need to check off the list this week prior to practice:
Read, read, read (and fill in the Matched Themes workbooks as you go)
Complete the weekly check in form (either Monday or Tuesday)
Write 10 questions (links to the question bank are found here)
Wednesday, October 22nd
Congratulations Connor and Bela on finishing all 10 books! 🎉
The battlers made a lot of great progress over the break! Please encourage students to keep up the good work and read, read, read.
Thank you to all the students (and parents!) writing questions! Keep those rolling in! The first practice sets have been constructed and the kids are excited when they hear their questions in the practice. ☺️ A few of the books have been completed by coaches. If you log into the question bank and see a tab turned red, that means we have plenty of questions for that book. If that is the ONLY book a student has, please write your ten questions on that book, as you will earn a ticket for every 10 questions. If you have an option to write questions for a book whose tab is not red, please write questions for that book instead. If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to reach out.
Have a great rest of the week!
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Below is a list of items students need to check off the list this week prior to practice:
Read, read, read
Complete the weekly check in form (either Monday or Tuesday)
Write 10 questions (links to the question bank are found here)
Wednesday, October 8th
The students racked up a ton of tickets this week reading and writing questions! Great job! I did see quite a few questions coming through late (after midnight). Please know that Battle of the Books should not be keeping our friends up, as we know how important rest is. Students can enter questions at anytime throughout the week, so no rush to get everything done Tuesday night.
We finished our scavenger hunt activity this week! Students are now experts on navigating to our website, finding the resources there; such as pronunciation guides, question banks, etc., and should be all set to accomplish their tasks each week. If your battler is still confused about locating their resources, please reach out. We are happy to walk them through the steps before or after practice.
Fall Break is upon us! Our 3rd/4th grade friends are reading machines and we even had our first 10 book finisher this week! 🎉Congratulations Elia! 🎉 New this year is a High-Five line for everyone who finishes all the reading! This gives us an opportunity to celebrate the hard work of these students. I'm excited to see who is next!💗
Our 5th/6th grade team is working hard to knock out some books over Fall Break! Be sure to bring a book or two along wherever you go.
Questions will start "disappearing" from the question banks. Don't panic! We are starting to compile our practice sets and the questions students work so hard writing each week are used to create these sets. So keep your ears open, your question might be the next one asked!! Note: All tickets will be distributed prior to the questions being moved over.
For our next practice on Wednesday, October 22nd, we will hopefully start our questions sets for both teams! See everyone after Fall Break. Have fun! 🍁
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Below is a list of items students need to check off the list this week prior to practice:
Read, read, read
Complete the weekly check in form (either Monday or Tuesday)
Write 10 questions (links to the question bank are found here)
Wednesday, October 1st
What a great group of kids! Everyone is engaged and very excited to be at BOTB VERY early in the morning! We are loving the enthusiasm from the group. ❤️
Today we passed out our first set of tickets (below is a list of ways students earn tickets and prizes each week), played a fun game highlighting the importance of communication and information delivery, and received ice cream coupons for anyone who has finished their first book! Next week we will knock out the scavenger hunt and hopefully get into some question writing (although this group is doing an AMAZING job writing questions already! Keep up the good work!)
Tickets earned:
For every (10) ten questions written in their team question bank
For every book read (up to 10 ten tickets - one for each book)
For every practice set completed (score does not matter) - these will be released later in the season
Prizes earned:
Completing the check in form each week
Cleaning up our practice space
Below is a list of items students need to check off the list this week prior to practice:
Fill out the contract with the student and parent(s)/guardian(s) (Contract)
Read, read, read
Complete the weekly check in form (either Monday or Tuesday)
Write 10 questions (links to the question bank are found here)
See everyone next Wednesday in the Heritage Library @ 7:30 a.m.
Wednesday, September 24th
What a great first practice! We got to know each other a bit and delve into what Battle of the Books is. Next week, we will finish our getting to know each other activities and complete our BOTB Scavenger Hunt! Below is a list of items students need to check off the list this week prior to practice:
Fill out the contract with the student and parent(s)/guardian(s) (Contract)
Read, read, read
Complete the weekly check in form (either Monday or Tuesday)
Write 10 questions (links to the question bank are found here)
See everyone next Wednesday in the Heritage Library @ 7:30 a.m.
Wednesday, September 17th
Parent information meeting - Wednesday, September 17th @ 5:30 p.m. in the Heritage Library
Practice begins Wednesday, September 24th @ 7:30 a.m. in the Heritage Library
All students must be signed up and have a completed contract prior to attending practice.
Battle of the Books is back! Check out the lists and start reading now!
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