The Fourth Grade Academic Bowl will have a fall tournament and a spring tournament. The fall tournament may  be held after October 22. The spring tournament may  be held after January 2, 2002. The coaches from the participating schools will determine the date and location of the tournament at a planning meeting to be held between September 24 and October 5, 2001.

Each school will receive eight certificates of participation, however, additional certificates may be purchased by the school district. A champion and runner-up plaque will be awarded for each tournament.

The tournament is for students in the fourth grade. Younger students may play on the fourth grade team. Older students may not participate on the fourth grade team.

FORMAT

1. The tournament will be a round robin tournament with no more than six teams assigned to any one site.

2. The game will be played in three periods:

a. The first and third period will each have 15 toss-up questions.

b. The second period will be a five question team question.

TOSS UP QUESTIONS

1. Each toss-up question will be worth ten (10) points.

2. A toss-up question is a free response question. The first team member to respond will be given the opportunity to answer the question.

3. Students may not confer before answering a toss-up question. Conferring is defined as: students work together to achieve an answer. Conferring can be done by talking, writing or hand signals. All forms of conferring will be counted as incorrect response.

4. To answer the question a student must be the first to buzz in.

5. The chief judge will call on the student to answer by calling the students name "Mary". (If opposing teams have students with the same name, the chief judge will identify the town "Bugtussle" then the name.)

6. The student may not answer until called on to do so.

7. If the student does not wait to be called on before beginning his/her answer the chief judge will issue a warning. The warning will be the first and only warning given for that round. It will serve as a warning to both teams.

8. If the student does not wait to be called upon before beginning his/her answer after the chief judge has issued a warning for that round the answer will not be accepted. The chief judge will say, "That is an incorrect response, you did not wait to be recognized before you gave your answer." The chief judge will not indicate if the given answer was correct or incorrect. The opposing team will be given the opportunity to answer the question.

9. If the answer given by the first responding team is incorrect, the moderator will call for an answer from the opposing team. "I'm sorry, that's incorrect, ______do you have an answer?"

9a. Even if the initial 10 or 15 seconds has expired, the team not ruled as incorrect will be given the opportunity to answer the question missed by the first responding team.

10. The opposing team member must signal and be recognized before the answer is given.

11. If both teams are incorrect, the correct answer will be given by the moderator.

12. It is not necessary for players to wait until a toss-up question has been completed to respond.

13. The moderator will stop reading the question immediately when a student buzzes in to answer a question.

14. If the interrupting student answers incorrectly, the moderator will finish reading the question for the opposing team by picking up the question in a logical spot. The opposing team must buzz in and be recognized before giving an answer.

15. Once a question has been read, the students will have ten (10) seconds in which to buzz-in. If neither team buzzes in the moderator will read the correct answer.

16. For math questions - Once the question has been read, the students will have 15 seconds to work the problem before buzzing in with a response. The moderator will say, "This is a math question" before reading the question.

17. Once a student is recognized by the chief judge an immediate response must be begun.

18. An immediate response is defined as allowing for a natural pause (no more than 3 seconds) once the students name has been called before he/she begins their answer.

19. The student should not preface his/her answer with a "stalling phrases". An example of a stalling phrase is: "The answer is " or "I think the answer is". Once the student has been recognized the actual content of the answer should be begun within a 3 second period.

20. Stalling will be called if the student takes more than a three count to begin an answer. (See Rule 19)

21. Once the answer has been begun, the student may not stall while giving the answer.

22. Stalling is handled like an incorrect response. The moderator will not identify the response as being correct or incorrect. "Stall. _______ do you have an answer."

23. Spelling questions. Stating the word before beginning to spell it is incorrect. eg. If the question is "Correctly spell the word egg." The answer is "e g g" NOT "egg, e g g"

23a. If the word to be spelled is a proper noun, the student does NOT have to say "capital" before the first letter.

24. Once the moderator has finished reading a question , it will not be repeated.

25. At the conclusion of the first period of play the moderator and chief judge will determine the score. The moderator will say "At the conclusion of the first period of play the score is team number one _____, _____points, team number two _____, _______points. Are there any questions?"

26. When the moderator asks "Are there any questions?" a team coach may lodge a protest about the correctness of a question or answer. After a pause the moderator will say, "This concludes the first period of play. Substitutes please check-in with the chief judge (or scorekeeper)."

SUBSTITUTION

Substitution is allowed at the following times:

1. After question seven.

2. Before the team question begins.

3. After the team question has been graded.

4. After question twenty-two.

5. In case of a tie, before the tie-breaker questions.

TEAM QUESTION

1. The team question is the second period. Each of the five team questions is worth ten points.

2. The moderator will read instructions to the teams then will distribute four question sheets and one answer sheet to each team.

3. Team members are not to open the question sheets until instructed to do so.

4. The moderator will read the set of instructions to the teams then tell them when to begin.

5. The four team members work together, confer, to answer as many of the questions as possible.

6. All answers go on the single answer sheet.

7. The teams will be given five minutes to answer the five questions. Time does not start until the question sheets have been pulled apart and distributed to each team member.

8. The moderator announces the remaining time at the end of each minute.

9. At the end of five minutes the moderator will say, "Stop working and hold your answer sheets in the air."

10. Students must stop when instructed to do so.

11. If a question specifically asks for correct spelling, misspelling will be counted as a missed question.

12. If the moderator and chief judge can understand the answer, misspelling will not count against general questions.

13. If the moderator and chief judge cannot read the answer because of sloppy writing or unintelligible spelling, the answer will be counted as a missed question. Make it neat!!

14. At the end of the allotted time the answer sheets will be collected and graded.

15. The moderator will read the questions from the team question as well as the correct response. The moderator and chief judge will indicate which questions were correct and which questions were incorrect.

16. The scores from the team questions will be added to the scores from the first period. The moderator will say, "At the conclusion of the second period of play the score is team number one _school_, _number_ points, team number two _school_, _number_ points. Are there any questions?"

17. When the moderator asks "Are there any questions?" a team coach may lodge a protest about the correctness of a question or answer. After a pause the moderator will say, "This concludes the first period of play. Substitutes please check-in with the chief judge (or scorekeeper)."

PROTEST

1. Only the head coach may protest procedure or question content.  No parent, student or other spectator will be allowed to lodge a protest or become involved in the protest discussion.

 2. A coach may protest procedure during any part of the game by standing until recognized by the chief judge.

3. A coach may protest over question content at the end of each period. If necessary, the coach may BRIEFLY confer with the student about the protest.

4. The moderator or judge may ask the student to clarify a protest or answer HOWEVER the official must initiate the dialog with the student. The student may NOT initiate the dialog with the official.

5. Students may NOT protest procedure or question content.

6. All protests will be made in a professional manner.

IF...

1. ...the first response was incorrect and the protest leads the chief judge to determine the second response was also incorrect (after it was initially ruled correct) a substitute question will be given for BOTH teams.

2. ...the protest leads the chief judge to determine an answer given by a team was incorrect and a substitute question is given. Only the team that did not miss the question will be allowed to answer.

3. ...after the first team response incorrectly the moderator inadvertently gives an answer to a question without allowing the opposing team an opportunity to answer. A substitute question will be given. Only the team that did not miss the question will be allowed to answer.

4. ...a question is ruled incorrect or "bad" or if there has been a procedural error, the replacement toss-up question will be read with both teams having the opportunity to answer.

5. ...someone other than the head coach insists on being involved in the protest procedure, they may be removed from the room.

THE END OF THE GAME

1. At the end of the third period of play the moderator and chief judge will check the score. The moderator will say, "At the conclusion of the game the score is team number one _____, _____points, team number two _____, _____points. Are there any questions?"

2. When the moderator asks "Are there any questions?" a team coach may lodge a protest about the correctness of a question or answer. After a pause the moderator will say, "This concludes the round."

2. If the game is tied, substitution will be allowed.

3. The tie will be broken by asking five tie breaker questions.

3a. If the score is still tied after the five questions, three additional questions will be asked.

3b. If the score is tied after the three additional questions the tie will be broken by sudden death. The first team to answer correctly will be the winner.

3c. The additional points gained during the tie breaker questions will not be added into the team teams total. The winning team will be awarded 10 points.

4. Once the round is declared over, no protests will be allowed. What is allowed as a correct response in one room might not be allowed as a correct response in another. No matter what the circumstances, a round will not begun again or replayed once it is declared over.

THE END OF THE DISTRICT TOURNAMENT

1. The round robin tournament winner is the team with the best won/loss record. If two teams have the same won/loss record, the team with the highest total points will be the winner.

2. If the won/loss record and the highest total points are identical, the two teams will compete in a best three out of five question tie breaker. The first team to respond correctly to three questions is the winner. Count will be made for correctly answered questions not questions asked.

WHAT TO TAKE

1. Your light board... Don't forget it!! It is important to have enough light boards and an extra or two in case of a break down.

2. Help for your host site... check with your host site to see if they need official help (timer, scorekeeper, moderator, judge...) Train your bus driver or son or daughter or parents to serve as officials.

3. Name tags to set in front of each student. These can be elaborate and permanent or simple tri folded pieces of typing paper. Have your students name (first name is okay unless you have two Matilda's then use an initial for the last name) and your school name.

Mary

Bugtussle

4. Eligibility roster - signed and dated by your principal for the week of competition. Give the eligibility roster to the host site tournament director. See page 28.

5. Large self addressed envelope to leave with the tournament director. Questions from the tournament will be mailed after all same level tournaments are completed. If you want a copy of the questions you must take your own envelope.