A Time to Give November 29, 2009

Topic of the Week: 11/30-12/4, 2009

Tying into our BOOKS ARE GREAT GIFTS campaign, we’re adopting a charity to support for the holidays. Reading Tree is a non-profit organization that collects books–new and used–for schools all over the world.

Phase one of LitChat’s multi-faceted BOOKS ARE GREAT GIFTS (#BAGG) campaign began with the creation of a “twibbon” (http://twibbon.com/join/Books-Are-Great-Gifts) created especially for Twitter users to adorn their avatar as a show of support for book sales. Adding to this phase, LitChat has issued a challenge to give $1 to its adopted literacy charity (The Reading Tree) for every Twitter user who wraps the #BAGG ribbon on their avatar (up to $250).

Phase two includes a section of the LitChat website devoted to book recommendations with links to book publishers, bookstores, book blogs, and reader reviews.

Phase three brings everything together with an auction of books donated and signed by authors. The auction will take place through Twitter on December 18, 2009, beginning at 8 p.m. EST. All proceeds from the Twitter auction will go directly to LitChat’s adopted charity, The Reading Tree.

Read more about how you can promote literacy while also promoting books, authors and publishing here.

On Friday, December 4, John Barger, executive director of Reading Tree will be our guest host. He’ll tell us about ways we can help promote literacy in our own communities, as explain the methods Reading Tree uses with recycling programs to get books into the poorest schools in America, Canada and several third-world countries. It’s exciting work.

Follow John on Twitter: @ReadingTree.