The #NickCFK Big Help Book Drive is putting the spotlight on reading and getting books into the hands of children who may not have access to the wonderful world available to them when they open up the pages of a book! There are so many children in our area whose parents are not comfortably literate and who may not value reading as much as our family.
Literacy is such an important part of creating student success and being a part of helping children to begin their reading careers is a passion of mine, but it's more than that - collectively we can make a huge difference by putting books into the hands of children:
- Students who do more reading at home are better readers and have higher math scores. Students with more types of reading materials in the home also demonstrate greater reading proficiency.
- 67% of fourth graders in the U.S. are reading below a Proficient level, according to the most recent National Assessment of Educational Progress.
- 61% of low-income families have no books for children in their homes, and more than 80% of the preschool and after-school programs serving at-risk children have no books at all.
- Approximately 8.7 million fourth through twelfth grade students struggle with required reading and writing tasks in school. For many adolescent students, ongoing difficulties with reading and writing figure prominently in the decision to drop out of school.
After an early supper, we left the boys with Wayne and my father-in-law and headed to the big Walmart near the outlet mall in North Charleston. The hardest thing about going to Walmart with a purpose is that there is so much more to look at... the minute that Robyn, my mother-in-law and I entered Walmart we saw deals everywhere and had to browse the clearance clothing for ourselves and the kids, pick up some groceries and try on shoes! You can see our whole shopping experience in my Google Plus album!
Once we finally made it to the book aisles, it was so hart to pick just a few books because Walmart has great selection and prices - but I knew what I was looking for: I focused on books at the kindergarten and preschool level and picked out some great books - Spongebob Square Pants, Dora the Explorer and a few fun non-fiction books
One of the great things about the Nickelodeon tie-in between their TV shows and books is that children react positively to the characters and engage in the book - they WANT to read it!
I was pleasantly surprised at just how many books I was able to get for around $25! Eleven books that will find their way into the hands of children from the Tri-County's poorest schools! I was really impressed with the Spongebob box set - 6 books for under $11!
My kids are also combing their bookshelves for gently used books that they will be passing along to new homes and we've invited all of our friends and neighbors to be part of our Big Help Book Drive too! If you are in the Charleston area and want to donate books to our drive, just email me at Heather@actingbalanced.com by Monday, September 10th and I'll arrange to meet up with you to collect them! I'll be delivering them to the Teacher's Supply Closet on Tuesday morning!
If you're not in the Charleston area, you can start your own Nick CFK Big Help Book Drive! It's really easy to organize a Big Help Book Drive in your community - just reach out and let people know that you are collecting new and gently used books for your local school, daycare, library, hospital or other organization and DO IT! Then you can share your Big Help Book Drive experience with everyone at Champions for Kids!
You can also get more information and follow Champions for Kids and Nickelodeon by checking out these links:
- Champions for Kids: http://championsforkids.org
- Champions for Kids Twitter Handle: https://twitter.com/#!/champions4kids
- Champions for Kids Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/ChampionsForKids
- Nickelodeon on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/nickelodeon
- Nickelodeon on Twitter: : @nickelodeontv https://twitter.com/#!/search/nickelodeon
- “I am a member of the Collective Bias™ Social Fabric® Community. This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias™ and Champions for Kids. #NickCFK #CBias All opinions are my own.
