WAW Award Voting Is Closed!

If you are a student, teacher, librarian, or parent in the state of Kansas, you're probably aware that the William Allen White Children's Book Award is the annual chance for kids to tell us what they like to read. A handful of books are chosen as nominees by the main selection committee, and then kids vote for their favorites to win the top prize in two categories: Grades 3-5 and Grades 6-8. Note that nominees were published two years ago, so these are all books from 2009-2010. This award is a great way for writers to find out what kids like--not just what their teachers and parents like. Here are the nominees for this year:

Nominees for Grades 3-5
fiction:

• Extra Credit by Andrew Clements
• Family Reminders by Julie Danneberg
• Also Known as Harper by Ann Haywood Leal
• Where the Mountain Meets the Moon  by Grace Lin
• 11 Birthdays  by Wendy Mass
• Fortune's Magic Farm by Suzanne Selfors

nonfiction:

• The Grand Mosque of Paris: A Story of How Muslims Rescued Jews During the Holocaust by Karen Gray Ruelle
• The Boy Who Invented TV: The Story of Philo Farnsworth by Kathleen Krull

Nominees for Grades 6-8
fiction:

•  Anything But Typical by Nora Raleigh Baskin
• The Amaranth Enchantment by Julie Berry
• All the Broken Pieces: A Novel in Verse by Ann E. Burg
• Wild Things by Clay Carmichael
• Double Eagle by Sneed B. Collard III
• My Name Is  Phillis Wheatley: A Story of Slavery and Freedom  by Afua Cooper
• Scat by Carl Hiaasen
• Operation Yes by Sara Holmes
• The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate by Jacqueline Kelly
• Confetti Girl by Diana Lopez
• Faith, Hope, and Ivy June by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor
• Heart of a Shepherd by Rosanne Parry
• Notes from the Dog by Gary Paulsen
• The Mostly True Adventures of Homer P. Figg by W. R. Philbrick
• The Great Death by John E. Smelcer

nonfiction:

• Years of Dust: The Story of the Dust Bowl by Albert Marrin

Winners for this year will be announced April 25, so stay tuned! How many have you read?