Hunger Games in the Library

With Hunger Games fever in the air, especially during the first weeks of March (our last two weeks of school before our spring break), we brought the saga of Katniss Everdeen, tribute from District 12, to our library.

We really love The Hunger Games around here.

Our first step was a reaping bowl--a big glass bowl borrowed from the dining hall for a classic write-your-name-on-a-slip-of-paper-and-if-we-pull-it-out-you-win! contest to be held during one of our assemblies.  I made a Hunger Games crossword and word find and if kids completed them, they could enter their names in the reaping bowl again.  Just like The Hunger Games, only you win prizes instead of being forced to fight to the death!

We also scheduled a Hunger Games library "event" during one of our tutorial blocks (a school-wide free block that occurs twice a week).  We had dozens of prizes from our wonderful Hunger Games shopping spree, and we planned three "stations:"  archery (with plastic bows and suction cup arrows), a Hunger Games trivia quiz, and a plant and flower scavenger hunt (designed and led by my sister, who is a naturalist at the nearby Kroening Interpretive Center and who is doing her own Hunger Games-inspired program in a couple weeks).  We promoted the event for about a week beforehand.  This is the first time our library has ever done a program like this, so there was no way to tell what our turnout would be.  We were pleased when about twelve kids showed up--most of them from our Reading Club, but all of them very welcome.

Our signs promoting The Hunger Games library event.

Students enter their names in the reaping (a red plastic bowl temporarily replaces the glass bowl, which the dining hall staff needed back for an event).

I tried to make the quiz challenging, but these kids are as Hunger Games obsessed as I am and several of them called me out on "questionable" multiple choice options.  I rewarded them with bonus points for arguing with me.

My sister gives instructions for the plant and flower scavenger hunt.

Searching the stacks for the correct plant or flower to match their given scenario (find a water plant you can eat, find a plant that you can make into tea, don't bring back the deadly but beautiful flowers, etc.).

Groosling, rabbit, tracker jacker and wolf mutt targets.

Target practice.

One of the most coveted prizes was The Hunger Games Official Illustrated Movie Companion.

Another prize:  a book of critical essays about The Hunger Games by other YA authors.

In retrospect, we could have been a bit more organized and possibly worked in another activity or two, and we could have planned the awarding of the prizes a little better.  As it was, we pretty much let the kids have at it, tried to keep scores as best we could, and brought out our box of goodies with about 30 seconds left before the end of the block.  It was great fun for us, and the kids who attended seemed to have a good time as well.  We're going to get comments and feedback from our Reading Club when students return from Spring Break next week.

Later in the week, after our library event, we held our reaping during assembly.  We projected a movie still of the reaping on stage behind our school director she pulled names from the bowl and read them out loud to the crowd of students, who definitely got a kick out of this activity--there was much cheering and laughing.  We awarded some of our most treasured prizes here, including a Katniss pillowcase and District 12 kneesocks.

An English teacher rushes on stage to volunteer as tribute (and claim her movie poster prize), complete with Katniss-style bow and arrow set and mockingjay pin.

The lucky winner of the amazing District 12 kneesocks.

 Finally, we had a special guest judge (social studies teacher) come in to judge the submissions from the coloring contest.  Kids got surprisingly creative; the winners and a few of our other favorites are below.

The "Peeta in the dark" one is my favorite; it just cracks me up.

 All in all, I'd call our Hunger Games program--our first real library program--a success.  We tried to include both passive programming (the coloring sheets, crossword and word find, and reaping) and active programming (the tutorial library event) in order to attract all our teenage patrons.  We'll do more programming like this in our continued effort to increase the library's presence in the school and to make the library a social space as well as a study space.

Also, did I mention that Lizz and I are both just really obsessed with The Hunger Games?  We kept the mockingjay pins for ourselves.  :)