National Reading Contest Attracts More than 24,000 Readers
Nearly 174,000 Books Read in Less than 2 Months
Baltimore, MD -- Book Adventure (www.bookadventure.org)
announced 12 students from across North America as winners of the Fall 2000 National Book Bonanza Contest.
More than 24,000 children in grades K-8 read over 173,900 books in the contest, sponsored by the Sylvan
Book Adventure Foundation. The contest took place for seven weeks from September 22 to November 10, 2000.
"We are so impressed by the contestants’ reading success. Their accomplishments are a shining example of
what today’s children can achieve," said Kelly Hodge-Williams, executive director of the Book Adventure
Foundation. "We are proud to be able to provide such encouragement to this new generation of readers."
The top Book Bonanza winners were:
- Grand Prize Grades K-3: Troy Methvin, 2nd Grade, Florence KY, 557 books
- Grand Prize Grades 4-8: Rachel Ermatinger, 5th Grade, Holland MI, 45 books (over 6000 pages)
- Second Prize: Jackie Irene Davis, Kindergarten, Bountiful UT, 342 books
The Grand Prize Winners receive a trip for four to Universal Studios in Florida. Second Prize Winner will
receive a "Starter Bookshelf" – a wooden bookshelf with 50 books. In addition, third prize winners
will receive an "Edutainment Fun Pack" filled with games, markers and crayons, books, toys and more.
"I love to read," said Rachel Ermatinger, "I had no idea that I would win, but I just kept
trying to go as high as I could to see how many books I could read."
"We were in the library checking out books almost everyday," said Troy’s mother, Mary Methvin. "Troy
read so many books that even the librarians were cheering him on."
Book Adventure is the free, online reading incentive program that makes reading fun for students
in grades K-8. Children use Book Adventure to create personalized books lists from over 4,000 titles, read the
books offline, take online quizzes on the books, and earn prizes for reading. Book Bonanza is the contest
sponsored by Book Adventure, in which the participants who read the most books at their grade level and earn
perfect scores on the online quiz for each title are rewarded with trips and prizes. Prizes are awarded in two
categories, grades K-3 and grades 4-8.
Based in Baltimore, MD, the non-profit Book Adventure initiative was created by the Sylvan Learning Foundation
for students in the United States and Canada. Sponsors of the Book Adventure initiative include Sylvan Learning
Center, R.R. Bowker, Barnes & Noble.com, and Houghton Mifflin. Grand prize contributors included Universal
Studios, Delta Air, Hilton Hotels and Budget Rent A Car, and the Rainforest Café. Additional sponsors
included Highsmith Inc., Patch Products, Crayola Products and the Lego Company.
BookAdventure.org is a free online reading program that uses technology and incentives to motivate children
(grades K-8) to read. Book Adventure currently has more than 380,000 registered users, with more than 30,000
classrooms using the site as a reading resource. Children have taken more than 1.6 million quizzes since the
site was established in April 1999.To sign up for Book Adventure, students, parents and teachers can log onto
the site at