I heard about this challenge on the most recent episode of the Books Between Podcast. This is a recently discovered podcast I really love all about middle grade books. The host Corrina Allen presented this as a summer reading idea, but the challenge itself is actually running all year. The idea is to read children's and young adult books that fit the categories and fill in a row vertically, horizontally, or diagonally to get a BINGO. Of course, you can get more than one BINGO or even go for a full card which would be 49 books total. (And having worked in therapeutic recreation at a nursing home in the past, my brain can't help recalling all the other BINGO's one can get -- the letters T, H, L, X, large round robin, small round robin... OK, I'll stop now!)
I've been crossing off some squares with books I've already read since January, but there's still plenty of reading left to do (and I may have missed a few!) Picture books certainly work for this challenge (there's a Caldecott category and a bunch of the other award categories have picture book winners), but I'm trying not to rely on them too heavily. The only category I'm totally stumped on is A book about someone that is your age. Hmmm. Not sure what to do about that one exactly. Maybe I could read an adult book for that one? But then again, ages are not often stated after the teen years, so that could still be tough! I could flip my age and read a book with a 13 year old instead of a 31 year old? Or just call it a no-go? I'll have to see what I can come up with. Though I do wonder what the Scholastic folks are doing for this one, because the (adult) writer of the post is definitely participating!
Anyone want to join me?
Download the BINGO card PDF here!
More info about the challenge here!