All three of Bancroft Elementary School’s fifth grade Reading Olympic teams won blue ribbons – the hi
ghest award – at the Chester County Reading Olympic competition. The Bancroft Brilliant Brains, Dragon Hurricanes, and Lightning Bolts competed with teams from other southern Chester County schools. Bancroft Elementary School’s teams demonstrated that they understood the 45 different books they read since September by answering comprehension questions about the books.
Reading Olympics is a reading incentive program intended to encourage students to read books from a variety of literary genres and answer comprehension questions in a team competition. Each team participates in three rounds of questioning. Teams have 20 seconds to provide the correct answer before the other team can answer and steal the point. By working as a team, students learn how to work cooperatively and depend on each other. Some students actually read all 45 books on the list, while others read a portion of the total 45. But everyone commits to be an expert on at least some of the books.
