As members of the Association for Librarian’s Services to Children gear up to debate who will win the John Newbery Medal, students in Angela Ramsey’s fifth grade class from Grass Lake Elementary have been pondering the same issue.

In October, a committee of children’s librarians from the King County Library System invited Ramsey’s class of highly capable students to participate in its annual Mock Newbery Election, a process which was started in 2005 to encourage professional development for the librarians.

“They decided that it would be interactive and fun for them to read different books that could be nominated,” Ramsey said. “It started last spring (with them) reading potential nominees. In doing this, there was a committee of these children’s librarians … they said, ‘You know, what would be more fun would be to get some kids involved to get their opinions.’”

Ramsey explained the librarians decided to choose a class from somewhere in King County and the students would read four of the top eight possible nominees for the Newbery Medal, which is awarded to the author of the most distinguished contribution to American literature for children, according to ALCS Web site.

“I asked the class if this was something they wanted to do and they did,” she said. “They were committed to it. So, our librarian Mimi Vosper, went out and bought the books one weekend.”

Starting in October, Ramsey’s students began reading the books, and as they only had one copy of each they were passed from one child to the next. Of the 25 students in her class, seven read all eight books.

In November, many of her pupils attended a book talk at the Covington library, Ramsey said.

“They gave away a lot of free books,” she said. “They talked about the different books. They came back from that all jazzed so it got them even more fired up.”

Almost every student read at least four of the books, which was a requirement for a field trip in mid-December to meet with the KCLS childrens librarians to offer their opinions on each title.

Victoria Hackett said having to put in that extra effort made the debate that much better because “it was actually a pretty good challenge because you had to read four books to go.”

Ramsey said the discussion with the librarians was an intense experience.

“They had chairs up in the front of the room like a firing squad,” Ramsey said. “My kids passed the microphone along and gave their opinions (of each book).”

Prior to the discussion with nearly 60 KCLS librarians in December at the Issaquah Regional Library, in addition to reading a number of the books, Ramsey’s students also wrote persuasive essays about the ones they thought should win the medal.

“We didn’t practice speaking in front of people,” Rachel Wanamaker said. “We weren’t trying to persuade them, we were trying to give our opinions and trying to help with which one we thought should win the Newbery award.”

Wanamaker added that the class did not have a unanimous choice and each student had made up their minds individually about their favorite but there seemed to be a consensus that “Best Bad Luck I Ever Had” was one of the top picks.

Dylan Hill explained that major theme of that title “stood out throughout the whole book” and that he found its take on race relations after the Civil War to be particularly interesting.

Jeni Lane said she “really felt nervous” when the class arrived for the discussion.

“When we finally got in there and I saw how many librarians were in there, my stomach kind of lurched,” Lane said. “When I finally got up there, I felt like I had the courage to talk.”

Thomas Richmond also had the jitters and that he had a rush of adrenaline but “once I started speaking I kind of felt prepared.”

“We just had to listen to what the other people (were saying),” Richmond said. “After the first three books, things were going pretty smoothly for us.”

Hannah Kaiaua read six of the books.

“I gave my opinion on every single one I read,” Kaiaua said. “I would say it lasted 45 minutes to an hour, maybe.”

Kaiaua thinks the experience made her like reading more.

“Some of the books were a lot better than the books I was reading before,” she said.

Tyler Brown said he got the impression the librarians favored one title, “The Rock and the River,” but Megan Ewing disagreed.

“I thought that they kind of all had different opinions and that one liked a certain book more than another,” Ewing said. “Sometimes when we said that they didn’t like a book, they were kind of in shock, so in some parts we were on the same page and in some parts we weren’t.”

Emma Sharer said she felt the experience was not just good for the students but for the librarians, as well.

“I actually think it reallly did help them see more like a kid and all of the opinions were different,” Sharer said.

Ramsey’s students recognized the benefits of their participation in KCLS’s Mock Newbery Election.

“I was the only one who had ready my favorite book, “Also Known as Harper,” it’s a really good book but it’s a little bit depressing,” Gabriella Sciuchetti said. “I think from writing the essay I had a better idea of why I liked it. Sometimes you like a book but you don’t really know why.”

Jordan Wayner said, “I think this was sort of to benefit reading and to see what the librarians thought the kids liked.”

Nori Natsuhara added “this was a really good experience for other people to read all these different books and books they would have thought would be boring but ended up being really good.”

Richmond said he hopes in the future that the librarians invite more students to get involved because his class is full of kids that enjoy reading.

“The important thing is to appreciate reading, that was the whole concept of this project,” Richmond said.

Alayna Cox said she would jump on this opportunity again if she were asked.

“I loved this, it was really, really fun and it got me really excited about reading,” Cox said. “I wish there was more books and I wish I had more time to read all eight.”

Learn more about KCLS’s Mock Newbery Election online.