What if I can only find 5 people for my team? Or what if I have 9?
We do require that all registration forms turned in have a minimum of 6 team members. They do not all have to be in the same grade or school, so check with other teachers or the school's Battle Coordinator to find other students who may need to find a team. The maximum number on a team is 8, so if you have 9 students interested, get the word out for those other teams who are looking for another member.

How do I find out where and when we battle?
Team Managers have three ways to find out where teams are assigned for the First Written Battle:

• pick up a schedule in the Youth Services Department
• call 837-3466
• check the assignment web page

Assignments for the First Written Battle will be available on February 1. When we call with the results of the Written Battles, you will be told if you are moving on to the next round and where you will be battling. Oral Battle participants will also be told whether they will be battling in the morning or afternoon.

What if we have a conflict on Oral Battle Day?
We are unable to honor requests to change times. Therefore, we try to keep our schedule of dates the same year to year, and we make our schedule available in the early fall, so people can plan on Battle in advance. We realize that there are many Saturday activities for students, especially in the morning, which is why we allow two alternates on each team.

Why can't I find out the answers from the Written Battle?
Battle books and questions are used again. To prevent future teams from having an unfair advantage, we do not share the questions and answers from Written Battles, nor do we allow note-taking at Oral Battles.

Why do so many books feature children with one or no parents?
The books on our Battle list are representative of children's literature, and stories featuring children with one or no parents are extremely common. The child main character needs to be the one dealing with the exciting, adventurous or scary things happening in the book, and many authors use the death of a parent as a plot device.

How can Battle be more fun?
Battle of the Books is a competition and there will eventually be one champion, but we truly believe that all participants are winners. To lower the stress level, we have changed the Oral Battle format to one that allows each team to compete against four other teams, and have created a more game-like format for the Championship Battle.

The Team Manager sets the tone for the team. Not every team will move on from one level to the next, and teams can be formed without the goal of becoming the "champion." Some teams might decide to spend more time on selected titles by discussing them in-depth, learning more about a particular time period, recreating recipes or doing related crafts.

Some Team Managers choose to reward team members throughout the competition or hold "mini-battles" with other teams from the same school. The time spent sharing books with other students and adults is one of the biggest benefits of Battle of the Books.

What about good sportsmanship?
Whenever possible, we applaud each team for participating, but in the end good sportsmanship is taught by the Team Manager. We give scores only to the Team Manager, and that person chooses how to give that information to the team. Battle of the Books allows students to learn how to be good winners as well as good losers, and we strongly encourage Team Managers to teach their team members to be sensitive to other teams.

Why can teams "lose" an oral battle and still go on to the Championship Round?
Oral Battle Day is designed to be more fun and less stressful than the "one loss and you're out" system for oral battles. There are many ways we can determine which team moves on to the Championship Battle, and we've decided on a format that doesn't penalize a team for losing nor overly reward a team for one win with a large margin. This system encourages every team to do its best in every battle, since one loss (or even more!) won't mean a team is out of contention. It's all about how many points you can earn compared to all the other teams.

Why are Oral Battle teams ranked to determine a winner?
If we used a straight point system, adding up all the points each team earns during their Oral Battles, there is a possibility that one team might have one really good battle and score enough points to move on to the Championship Battle even with three other low-scoring battles. By ranking the teams, we can award a maximum of 8 points to the highest scoring team in each room and allow more teams the possibility of being the one to move on. One battle will not make the Champion.