The Little First-Graders That Could: Long Branch Students Earn 500 New Books for Library

By Stacey Finkel, the Pearson Foundation

First-graders at Long Branch Elementary School received a very special visit last week from We Give Books and LeapFrog.

Long Branch participated in We Give Books' Read for My School campaign this past spring. The students and families read more than 500 books online and were chosen from hundreds of schools to receive a special reading celebration on Tuesday from We Give Books and LeapFrog. The students received books and Leapfrog prizes valued at more than $1,000.

Some of the most-read books in the spring campaign were "The Little Engine That Could," "The Tale of Peter Rabbit" and "The Ugly Duckling."

The Long Branch students earned 500 new books for their library thanks to the campaign.

The Read for My School program is a classroom-based reading initiative that gives public elementary schools and community members the chance to join together in an online reading campaign.

In the process, participants have the opportunity to earn direct donations of brand-new hardcover and paperback books for their schools.

This year, We Give Books readers earned 150,000 printed LeapFrog books for their schools in just 10 days. More than 900 schools across the United States earned books in the 2013 campaign.

We Give Books provides anyone with access to the Internet the opportunity to read high-quality children’s books online for free at www.wegivebooks.org.