Saturday I took our school's Battle of the Books team to our regional competition at Thurston high school. (I am the coach) There were 52 elementary school teams there ready to compete. Our team is a young team - all 3rd and 4th graders - so I wasn't sure how well they would do. Benjamin is one of the two 3rd graders on the team, and he has worked very hard reading all of the books (16 of them) and studying questions. But two of our team members have only read half the books, so I wasn't sure if the other three team members could carry the bulk of the knowledge.
The kids were excited at ready to compete when the battles started. There are only 4 team members and an alternate. We took turns switching out the two kids who hadn't read all the books. Our battles during pool play were against two schools named Laurel and Maple. I have never heard of either school, but apparently one is from Junction City and one is from Springfield. At the end of pool play, they take the top 16 teams with the most points. Win/loss doesn't count at this point (although we won both our battles). We ended up with 113 total points. If you answer all your questions in a battle, the most you can get is 40 points in a battle, and 80 points total in pool play. But, you can steal the other team's questions if they answer them wrong.
While we were waiting to see if we made it into the top 16 bracket, the kids took some funny pictures and ate lunch.
The kids were worried when they started announcing the top 16 teams, because they start with 16th place and work up, and they didn't hear our school name. I knew we had made it in when I heard #11 Malabon called, because I had talked to their coach and knew they got 87 points total. But it shocked us all when we found out we were the #1 team going into the sweet sixteen brackets. The kids were jumping around screaming and excited!
Once the sweet 16 starts, it is all about win/loss. Each time we won a battle (and they were all close!), the kids were so excited!
We moved up gradually until we were in the quarterfinals with St. Paul. The highest a team from Yujin Gakuen has ever finished is 3rd place, and we wanted to beat that this time. When they won their quarter finals battle, everyone was excited, because we knew it was a guarantee we were going to state. (They take the top three teams because our region has grown so much. The last time we took third, they only took the top two teams, so we missed out). But they were really excited to be playing for first place too!
It was held in the auditorium, on the stage, with microphones and twice as many questions as usual. We were playing Prairie Mountain school from the Bethel school district.
Our team was so surprised/shocked/happy when they won! First place! They only won by one question (5 points), so it was a close battle. I couldn't believe we had actually gone all the way. I had been trying to coach a winning team for 7 years, and we finally did it! Of course it is the kids who get the credit. They have to read, remember the info, and answer the questions. But I like to think that I help them :) I read all the books too, and quiz, motivate, and work these kids.
Benjamin was so excited! He kept saying that now he had done something his sisters hadn't done, because none of their OBOB teams had ever taken first place. Now we get to prepare for the state competition on April 11.
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