Spring Hill College is participating in a children’s book drive, “Books4Eagles,” beginning April 2 and concluding on April 19.

Kappa Delta Epsilon, SHC’s Education Honor Society, and the Literacy Coalition of South Alabama have launched the drive for 55 first-grade students at Ella Grant Elementary School in Prichard. The purpose, according to the Literacy Coalition, is “to promote literacy in our community by donating a set of children’s books to every first-grader at Ella Grant Elementary School for their home libraries.”

Ella Grant Elementary is Title I school for children in grades pre-kindergarten to five. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, Title I schools are public schools with high numbers or percentages of lower-income children.

The Literacy Coalition seeks to collect donations of new (or like-new) hard-cover children’s books that are appropriate for first-grade students. Examples include Dr. Seuss books.

Lisa Emanuelli, of SHC’s Division of Communication, Visual and Performing Arts, said Spring Hill division secretaries will receive the donations from April 2 to 19. College students can help, she said, by hunting down bargain books at area dollar stores. Members of KDP will pick up book donations from Division Secretaries and various Departments on Mondays in April.  For more information, please email [email protected]. 

Recommended books for this age group include:

• “Goodnight Moon,” by Margaret Wise Brown.
• “Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?” by Bill Martin and Eric Carle.
• “The Day the Crayons Quit,” by Drew Daywalt.
• “Green Eggs and Ham,” by Dr. Seuss.
• “The Very Hungry Caterpillar,” by Eric Carle.
• “The Snowy Day,” by Ezra Keats.
• “Guess How Much I Love You,” by Sam McBratney.
• “The Story of Ferdinand,” by Munro Leaf.
• “Pete the Cat,” by Eric Litwin and James Dean.
• “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie,” by Laura Numeroff.
• “The Little Engine that Could,” by Watty Piper.
• And fairy tales such as “The Three Little Pigs,” “The Gingerbread Man,” “Three Billy Goats Gruff,” and “The Ugly Duckling.”