First Book Blog

Stories of impact, the latest research, best practices, curated book lists, and more.

Surf's Up: Pi Phi Surf Classic Benefits First Book

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Today’s post comes to First Book from the Pi Beta Phi chapter at UC San Diego. Pi Beta Phi is one of First Book’s fantastic partners. Their generosity and dedication have helped us get new books into the hands of thousands of kids from low-income communities. On Sunday, May 15th, the Pi... Read more

John Merrow: Vocabulary is King

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Today’s guest blog post is from John Merrow, education correspondent for PBS NewsHour and president of Learning Matters. Merrow is also the author of The Influence of Teachers. Recently, while editing a piece for PBS NewsHour about ‘the vocabulary gap’ that develops in the first three years of life, I... Read more

Rick Riordan & James Patterson Event to Benefit First Book

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Two of our favorite children’s book authors (two of everyone’s favorite children’s book authors, really), Rick Riordan and James Patterson, will be appearing, together for the first time, at Lincoln Center in New York City next month. The two authors will read from their latest titles (including exclusive first looks)... Read more

Every Book Can Make a Difference

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I know you receive a great many stories like this one, but your survey wouldn’t allow for something like this to be entered, so I thought I would share this with you personally. As you are probably aware, our school deals with at-risk teens. Because of your grant and the... Read more

First Book and Tata Celebrate Earth Day

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In celebration of Earth Day, First Book asked our friends at Tata Consultancy Services to send us a post in support of our blog series on STEM education.  Tata is committed to enhancing environmental performance through the reduction of their carbon and ecological footprints and involvement of business associates and... Read more

Why I Chose First Book: Colleen Ludington

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Colleen Ludington is a children’s book author, mother of two and community volunteer, and has helped distribute 144,000 new books to children from low-income neighborhood in Charlotte. N.C. over the last five years. “It’s not just awesome,” she said. “It’s really rewarding.” Read more

Thank you so much …

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This week is National Volunteer Appreciation Week, and we want to take a moment to say “Thank you!” to all the First Book volunteers – the interns who give their time and knowledge at the First Book offices, the volunteers who come out to our reading parties and book distributions,... Read more

National Library Week!

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April is a big month for literacy; not only do we get to celebrate National Poetry Month and National Bookmobile Day, we also get to celebrate National Library Week! We are especially passionate about libraries at First Book; many books from the First Book Marketplace end up on library shelves across... Read more