First Mock Geisel on Guessing Geisel

Mock Awards can take many forms. All have varying levels of similarity to the committee experience, and many adhere to the criteria to the degree that they can. We’ve discussed on this blog some of the ways to adapt the mock award experience for working with students, and in the future we'll be covering some of the ways that mock awards can serve as professional development opportunities for librarians and teachers.

The actual Geisel Committee will have two full days to discuss and deliberate face to face in January, and will have spent the previous year reading, rereading, reviewing and assessing, observing beginning readers, and preparing their suggestions and nominations.

For most Mock Awards, participants may not have read all of the titles under consideration. If they are able to gather in person, it is often for no more than an hour or two, or their discussions may be spread out over the course of many weeks or months. If they are not able to gather in person, that component of face to face discussion is missed entirely.

But we’re going to do it anyway, because the more closely we can examine the criteria and mimic the balloting process, the more insight we have into the process. We come to see how only one honor book might be awarded in a given year, or how six honors might be chosen. We see how it could take multiple ballots to determine a winner, or how it might be settled after the first one. Only seven people in the entire country will actually know what happened in the room in any given year, and they will never tell. But by mimicking the experience, we develop a keener sense of how things might develop behind those closed doors.

Not to mention, it’s fun!

Sample Ballot from the Geisel Manual

Our Guessing Geisel Mock Vote will be conducted as follows:

1. At the bottom of this post is a list of titles, to which we invite you to add your suggestions and nominations. Comment and tell us what excellent contenders are missing from our list. Or, make an argument for your favorites already included.
2. A first ballot will be live from January 1st–7th. To mimic the voting process of the actual committee, you will have room on your ballot for three titles. A first place vote will be worth 4 points, a second place vote 3 points, and a third place vote will be worth 2 points. It's not required that you have read all books to participate, although we recommend reading as many as possible and reading reviews here and elsewhere. Check out Travis Jonker’s 2017 Geisel Award Predictions post for an additional take on some of our contenders. We are open to the possibility that we, just like the real committee, may have a clear winner after a first ballot, in which case we'll stop there and announce our results.
3. If the first ballot does not produce a clear winner, we’ll conduct a second ballot from January 7th-14th. The real committee would keep going until they met the criteria for determining a winner, but we will stop after our second ballot and determine our winners.

We invite you to join us for this virtual Mock Geisel, and hope that you’re enjoying this first year of Guessing Geisel as much as we are. 

2017 Mock Geisel Contenders 

• Get a Hit, Mo! by David A. Adler, illustrated by Sam Ricks 
• Noodlehead Nightmares by Tedd Arnold, Martha Hamilton, and Mitch Weiss 
• My House by Byron Barton 
• Rabbit & Robot and Ribbit by Cece Bell 
• Leave Me Alone! by Vera Brogsol
• Up by Joe Cepeda 
• Nate Likes to Skate by Bruce Degan 
• Andy & Sandy and the First Snow by Tomie DePaola
• Andy & Sandy's Anything Adventure by Tomie DePaola  
• When Andy Met Sandy by Tomie DePaola 
• Barnacle is Bored by Jonathan Fenske 
• You Are NOT a Cat! by Sharon Flake, illustrated by Anna Raff 
• Owl Sees Owl by Laura Godwin, illustrated by Rob Dunlavey 
• Not Me! by Valeri Gorbachev 
• The Princess in Black and the Hungry Bunny Horde by Shannon Hale and Dale Hale, illustrated by LeUyen Pham 
• The Princess in Black Takes a Vacation by Shannon Hale and Dale Hale, illustrated by LeUyen Pham 
• Can I Tell You a Secret? by Anna Kang, illustrated by Christopher Weyant 
• We Are Growing! by Laurie Keller and Mo Willems 
• We Found a Hat by Jon Klassen 
• Snail and Worm: Three Stories about Two Friends by Tina Kugler 
• What's Up, Chuck? by Leo Landry 
• Big Cat by Ethan Long 
• Pug by Ethan Long 
• The Real Poop on Pigeons! by Kevin McCloskey 
• Go, Otto, Go! by David Milgrim 
• Cockatoo, Too by Bethanie Deeney Murguia 
• The Blobfish Book by Jessica Olien 
• Good Night, Owl by Greg Pizzoli 
• This is Not a Picture Book by Sergio Ruzzier 
• Mr. Putter and Tabby Hit the Slope by Cynthia Rylant 
• The Cookie Fiasco by Dan Santat and Mo Willems 
• The Mixed Up Truck by Stephen Savage 
• Best in Snow by April Pulley Sayre
• Dance! Dance! Underpants by Bob Shea 
• Is That Wise, Pig? by Jan Thomas 
• What This Story Needs is a Hush and a Shush by Emma J. Virjan 
• What This Story Needs is a Munch and a Crunch by Emma J. Virjan 
• They All Saw the Cat by Brendan Wenzel 
• The Thank You Book by Mo Willems 
• Duck, Duck, Porcupine! by Salina Yoon 
• Monsters Go Night Night by Aaron Zenz