School District 72 held the 17th annual Battle of the Books at the Timberline Theatre on March 19.
Battle of the Books is a literacy competition held by the school district’s teacher-librarians to promote reading. Contests were held for students in grades 3, 4, 5 and middle school.
For each contest, six books were identified for the students to read, starting in October. Teams competed by answering questions about the books testing their recollection and knowledge of the material they read.
At each elementary and middle school, teams competed first to be school champions. The top two teams from each middle school went to the district championship, while the elementary school champions had to win a zone championship before moving to the district championship where only three teams per grade competed.
The grade 3 contest was very close, but the Pinecrest School team, the Candy Crew, comprised of Claire Cooledge, Maddie Brodie and one other student, won with a perfect score. Quadra Island’s team, the Pigeon Warriors, won the grade 4 battle. They were Cleo Abram-Veloso, Gabrielle Doll and Savannah Nimmon.
Grade 5 was won by the Ridgeback Riders of Penfield, which included Isaac Fleming, Taylor Barton, and one other student who cannot be named due to a privacy request.
The middle school champions this year were the Wild Freaks of Southgate. The three students on that team cannot be named due to privacy requests.
Bruce Izard served as this year’s master of ceremonies.