From Where Does The Fantastic Digital Content Come From : Books

We live in a time when digital wizards can create just about anything that can be imagined for the latest movies or video games. But where does the imagination come from?

From books, pages of words and pictures that come to life in the mind.

DVDs and video games will occupy a child, but books will develop the child's mind -- and keep that child company like nothing else.

A book can be a cozy refuge, a great adventure, a teacher, an inspiration, a source of vivid dreams. Give a kid a book and you never know what else you are giving along with it. Reading is, in so many ways, the key to lifelong learning.

With the help of readers like you, the Free Press (Detroit, USA) has since 1987 been feeding children's dreams through our Gift of Reading program. Through donations of books and money, more than 500,000 books have been distributed to children and countless literacy programs have been bolstered.

The aim is to get young people fired up about reading -- and to make sure they get presents this holiday season. In some case, books from the program may be the only gifts they receive.

You can help by buying books geared to children 6 and younger and dropping them -- unwrapped -- at any of the sites listed here, including libraries, bookstores and the Free Press.

If you want to make your dollar go further, send a tax-deductible check or money order; the newspaper purchases its books in bulk and can buy more for less.

The point is to give something, a donation that can make a holiday festive, boost literacy and start a child on a path to a lifelong habit that can offer a whole new way to see the world around them.

Source: http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051125/OPINION01/511250465/1068