Stevenson students triumph in book ‘Battle’

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Updated: February 27, 2012 8:34AM

Stevenson School has no shortage of bookworms.

After an undefeated season the past fall in Niles’ annual Battle of the Books competition, the East Maine School District 63 elementary school came out on top in an inter-library championship against Morton Grove.

Stevenson’s Jan. 9 and Jan. 11 victories against Morton Grove’s Jerusalem Lutheran School made them local reading champs for the second year in a row.

To celebrate the season’s end Niles Public Library held a special ceremony last week in the young readers’ honor with guest speaker Katherine Hannigan, author of the award-winning children’s novel “Ida B.”

Christine Douglass, Stevenson School’s library and media specialist and Battle of the Books coach, said the annual reading-trivia competition is “a fantastic collaboration between public libraries and schools.”

Schools serviced by Niles Public Library are invited to participate.

This year about 100 fourth-, fifth- and sixth-graders from Culver, Nelson, St. John Brebeuf and Stevenson schools faced off in seven reading battles between October and December.

Librarians quizzed students from a list of 62 books, among them: popular cartoon novel “Diary of a Wimpy Kid,” Newbery Medal-winning “Number the Stars” and Lewis Carroll’s classic “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.”

Teams accrued points by correctly answering questions related to the books’ plots, settings and characters.

Not only do participants become whiz kids on children’s lit, Douglass said, but they develop confidence and passion in the process.

“I have seen struggling readers catch the love of a good book,” she said. “I have seen shy and introverted kids come out of their shells and excel.”

Unfortunately, cutbacks in recent years have forced some schools to drop out of the competition, Douglass said.

“It’s a shame,” she said. “Battle of the Books is a very important program.”