By Tyler Wright
For the first time, a group of six year seven students at Mountain District Christian School in Monbulk have put their judging caps on for the Children’s Book Council of Australia’s (CBCA) 2022 Shadow Judging Program.
Mountain District Christian School was funded by the CBCA to participate in the second ever shadow judging project, and was sent six contenders for Book of the Year in the Younger Readers category.
Students Caleb, Ryan, John, Esther, Mia and Liam dug into ‘Dragon Skin,’ by Karen Foxlee, ‘The Detective’s Guide to Ocean Travel’ by Nicki Greenberg, ‘Huda and Me’ by H. Hayek, ‘A Glasshouse of Stars’ by Shirley Marr, ‘Exit Through the Gift Shop’ by Maryam Master and illustrated by Astred Hicks, and ‘Rabbit, Soldier, Angel, Thief’ by Katrina Nannestad; nominating ‘Rabbit, Soldier, Angel, Thief’ as their group pick for best novel. according to CBCA judging criteria.
The group weren’t alone in enjoying the novel, with ‘Rabbit, Soldier, Angel, Thief’ taking out the title of winner in the 2022 Shadowers’ Choice Award Younger Readers category on Friday 26 August.
Caleb’s favourite book was ‘Huda and Me;’ a tale of two Lebanese children who run away to the other side of the world in order to escape their babysitter.
“There was mystery at the end, I don’t want to spoil too much, but it was it was really interesting in the end,” Caleb said.
Each group member had to make a creative response inspired by their chosen novel, and Caleb made a Lego stop-motion trailer of 400 pictures.
Esther’s created a poster in response to the novel ‘Exit Through the Gift Shop,’ which focuses on a twelve and a half year old girl living with cancer.
It was also Esther’s first time reading a book in the second person.
“It’s a confusing style to read, because it’s basically forces you to pretend you are the character and you are doing all the things; sometimes you have character names but you actually become the character, which was an interesting book to read.”
‘A Glasshouse of Stars,’ by Shirley Marr was named the CBCA Book of the Year in 2022, which was met with mixed reactions from the Mountain District Christian School group.
“Most of us weren’t happy about the actual winner,” John said.
“The book was just this tragedy,” Caleb added.
On the other hand, Mia and Esther maintain it is a “good book”.
Teacher librarian Caren Wyngaard, who applied for funding for Mountain District Christian School to be involved in the CBCA’s shadow judging program, said the group discussed topics like wealth, death, class and corporal punishment while reading the books from term two.
“It’s been lovely to have kids who are really enthusiastic, who want to read, and we’ve had some really great discussions because the books bring up some interesting topics,” Mrs Wyngaard said.
“Their class teacher allowed me to have [the students] in certain periods when they were doing English…[they] had to agree that if they missed out on any classwork while they were with me, they needed to then catch up.
They’re begging to do it again next year.”
It is quite clear the current year sevens would jump at the chance to shadow judge again.
“I would really encourage other schools to do it, because it was lots of fun,” Esther said.
“It was a good bonding experience to read all the books and then have to spend hours talking about it together.”
To learn more about the CBCA’s Shadow Judging Project, visit https://cbca.org.au/
