2025 Registrations are now open!
What is Shadow Judging?
The Sun Project; Shadow Judging program is an initiative by the Children’s Book Council of Australia to engage Australian children in quality literature by Australians creators, to encourage reading for pleasure and to create a social and teambuilding activity around reading.
Shadow Judges...
- Group with an adult facilitator.
- Read the six books in their chosen category from the CBCA Book of the Year Awards Shortlist.
- Discuss the books and judge them against the official criteria.
- Create Creative Responses to share on this site.
- Vote collaboratively to nominate a winner in their category. The votes from all groups will be tallied and the winners will be announced in the official Book of the Year Awards Winners announcement event at the start of Children’s Book Week® on August 15.
Groups...
are made up of Australian children led by a responsible adult facilitator. Groups can emerge from a range of origins from all around Australia, including schools, early childhood centres, public libraries, community groups, home schools and even families! There are no constraints on group size, but we recommend groups of 3-25. Each group gets only one vote.
Group Facilitators...
are responsible adults who lead a Shadow Judging group. Each group must have at least one facilitator. A facilitator will…
- Create the group and register in the Shadow Judging program.
- Provide their group with required resources (including copies of the Shortlisted books) and a safe space for group meetings.
- Coordinate group meetups and guide their group through discussions of the books and criteria.
- Represent their group in any communications with the CBCA.
- Submit their group’s Creative Responses to the books online.
- Vote on behalf of the group.
- Distribute completion certificates to group participants.
How to register:
Register for an account on our website here: Register – CBCA Shadow Judging Book of the Year Awards.
As part of the registration process you will be required to add at least one Group in a chosen category (you can add more groups and change category after registration) and make a payment for the Groups that have been added. Each group will incur an entry fee of $50 payable by card as part of the registration process.
Upon registration you will be sent a login link. This link is how you will sign in for the duration of the program, so we recommend bookmarking it. Logging in will give you access to online Resources (more to be added after the Shortlist announcement), Creative Response submission and Voting.
And that’s it – it’s time to start reading!
Important Tip!
It is recommended that facilitators register as soon as possible and establish a timeline for reading and discussions in their group. This is particularly important for judges of the Older Readers and Younger Readers categories to ensure judges have adequate time to read all six books in the Shortlist.