Canadian Charity Tackles Illiteracy with Huge Book Donation of Children's Stories from the Middle East

CALGARY (February 9, 2010) – Forty-five literacy non-profits across Canada will together receive a donation of 25,000 children's books this week to help in the ongoing battle against illiteracy. The books, adaptations of traditional tales from the Middle East, Afghanistan and Central Asia, will be donated by the Calgarybased Institute for Cross-cultural Exchange (ICE) and will target thousands of atrisk children across the country.

"We provide new books with real depth and cross-cultural content to Canadian literacy programs for children at risk," says ICE National Director David Cottle. "The children who receive these books are those in the greatest need and who are in a position to benefit most from them. The books are given to the children to keep."

The book donation comes at a difficult time for literacy organizations, many of which have struggled to keep their programs viable in recent years because of decreases in funding and declines in resources.

It is estimated that fifteen percent of Canadians are functionally illiterate. Lack of access to books is known to be the leading cause of childhood illiteracy.

The books – in large format, with full-color illustrations – are published by Hoopoe (www.hoopoekids.com) and are based upon traditional stories from Afghanistan, Central Asia and the Middle East. Told by campfire and candlelight for many centuries, and known by Western psychologists as "Teaching Stories", these tales address universal themes such as overcoming difficulties, building self-esteem and finding peaceful solutions to conflicts.

Hoopoe's books have been enthusiastically reviewed by the educational media and are widely commended for their ability to help foster thinking skills, which makes them doubly effective with at-risk populations. Their cultural content provides children with an important tool in which to better understand other parts of the world and their people.

"The books facilitate cross-cultural understanding, particularly of the Middle East and Central Asia and Afghanistan, at a time when knowledge of those parts of the world has become very important," Cottle adds.

ICE (www.iceeducation.org) is an all-volunteer Canadian charity that addresses family literacy and promotes understanding between cultures. Next month's distribution will bring the total of Hoopoe books that ICE has donated Canadawide to 46,600. Among the organizations receiving the books will be the Yukon Literacy Coalition, B.C.'s Success by Six, Alberta's Calgary Reads and Frontier College in Toronto.

The books were shipped from Vancouver at the end of January and will reach literacy groups in the middle of February.

For more information about the book donation, ICE or Hoopoe Books, please contact: David Cottle (403-313-2796), director@iceeducation.org.