NEW YORK, Jan. 4, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Students from schools nationwide joined together to read more than 160 million minutes to help donate 1 million books to kids in need this holiday season. It is all part of the Scholastic Book Clubs' Paws For Reading, a program that encouraged teachers to sign up and have their students log reading minutes for either the cats or dogs team. For every 20 minutes a student read and logged, a book was donated to Scholastic Book Clubs' ClassroomsCare literacy partners including Paws for Healing, Reach Out and Read, Save the Children, and The Lisa Libraries, up to 1 million books. 

(Logo:  http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20100907/SCHOLASTICLOGO)

"We were so impressed by how quickly kids reached the initial goal of 250,000 books in early October, that we decided to raise the donation to 1 million books," said Judy Newman, President of Scholastic Book Clubs and E-Commerce. "With the Common Core State Standards shifting how students learn in school, it is more important than ever for kids to establish good reading habits at home and practice reading every day. Congratulations to both the dogs and cats teams, who are both winners for their reading and giving this holiday season."

With the final tally in, team dog trampled the competition with 95,096,927 minutes read, while team cats logged 65,327,508 minutes. More than 200,000 kids and 22,000 teachers nationwide participated in the Paws for Reading program. Teachers encouraged their students to keep reading using the online reading logs, hanging posters where kids could sign up for a team, and using printable downloads of activities from the website including bookmarks, pledge cards, locker posters, word searches and crossword puzzles.

"The teams helped support each other to read chapter books and to push each other to read MORE!" said Tera Nadolski, fifth grade teacher at Walnut Creek Elementary in Papillion, Nebraska. "I saw an amazing increase in my student's desire to read this year due to the Paws for Reading program! My class of 20 has read 296 books!"

ABOUT SCHOLASTIC BOOK CLUBS' CLASSROOMSCARE:
Scholastic Book Clubs started the ClassroomsCare program as a way for students to give back through reading. ClassroomsCare partners with charities to give children in need access to quality books. Scholastic Book Clubs' ClassroomsCare has donated over 10 million books to kids in need since 2001. Kids who participate in ClassroomsCare learn the value of giving. They develop reading skills through activities that promote literacy. And they are empowered by the knowledge that their actions can impact the world in positive ways.

Visit http://www.scholastic.com/paws to learn more about Paws for Reading, and for more information about Scholastic, visit our Media Room.

Contact: Nadia Almahdi, Scholastic, 212-343-6355, nalmahdi@scholastic.com

SOURCE Scholastic