What a great day to kick-off summer reading! The weather is just gorgeous outside and we had a super fun Ultimate Author Showdown – or “SMACKDOWN” as host Jon Scieszka renamed it – with Scholastic Summer Challenge authors Lisa Yee, R.L. Stine, Christopher Paul Curtis and Gordon Korman.
We’ve blogged about Scholastic Summer Challenge before but we wanted to share with you some great news! Christopher Paul Curtis is the winner of the Ultimate Author Showdown! As the winner, Christopher randomly selected a participating school to win a classroom makeover full of books, magazines and classroom resources worth $3,500! His winning pick? Congrats to Ms. Melissa Hinerman who teaches at Wilsonburg Elementary in Clarksburg, West Virginia!
The authors were up against some tough questions sent from classrooms around the world. Not to mention, the audience was PACKED with kids from public schools all around NYC who rooted for their author louder than any baseball game I’ve been to. Now’s your child’s chance to join in on the Scholastic Summer Challenge and help Read for the World Record to beat last year’s minutes of 35,846,094! Register and watch the replay of the webcast here: http://www.scholastic.com/summer.
We want to say thank you to all of the classrooms who watched and a big thanks to Ms. Lisa Olaynack’s class at Thompson Middle School in Newton, Rhode Island. Her class was our Skype “call-a-classroom” that authors called on when they were stumped! Ms. Olaynack’s kids are super smart and they were right on with all of the answers.
Don’t forget that you can also participate in Scholastic’s Summer Challenge by helping us put more books into the hands of kids in need by donating to our Summer Challenge Champion: Reading is Fundamental (R.I.F.)! Just visit for more information. All kids deserve a good book to read – especially in the summer!
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Previously On Our Minds:
* The Ultimate Author Showdown is almost here!
* Author Jon Scieszka on the On Our Minds “hot seat”
* Just around the corner: Summer Challenge LIVE!