How McDonald’s Canada’s Happy Meals Can Reveal the Joy of Reading!

I love reading. I’ve always been reading. As long as I can remember I’ve been reading! My penchant for stories defined me from my earliest days—I devoured tales faster than my Mom could get ’em from the Mississauga Library! I don’t even know what my life would look like if it weren’t for reading—it’s part of just about everything I do. Business case writing. Blogging. Even the spelling bees I’d win when I was eight. Reading’s proved essential to my growth, and I have no plans for my children to do without it, either.

But I should count us lucky. There’re thousands of Canadian kids growing up without a reading culture in their lives. And I get it—parents are too busy. Too tired. And it definitely doesn’t help that thousands of Canadian children don’t even have a book in their homes! Reading’s key to unlocking a child’s potential—if you rob them of reading, who knows what opportunities they’ll miss?

Knowing it’s far better to be part of the solution since being part of the problem hurts us all, McDonald’s Canada introduced an excellent way to get books into the hands of children who might not have them otherwise!

That’s right—as of May 16^th, McDonald’s Canada gives kids the choice of a toy or a book with their Happy Meals, which changes a lot about reading’s accessibility for our nation’s youth! In partnership with Kids Can Press—the world’s largest children’s book publisher—and First Book Canada, a non-profit organisation providing access to books to children who might not get them otherwise, McDonald’s Canada now offers high-quality children’s literature so everyone gets the same chance to fall in love with reading!

How? Every eight weeks, two new books written by Canadian authors will be available in-restaurant in both English and French! The list includes:

• Franklin the Turtle—Paulette Bourgeois
• Scaredy Squirrel—Melanie Watt
• The Busy Beaver—Nicolas Oldland
• No Dragons For Tea—Jean E. Pendziwol
• Franklin’s Halloween—Paulette Bourgeois
• Scaredy Squirrel Makes a Friend—Melanie Watt
• Making the Moose Out of Life—Nicolas Oldland
• Once Upon a Dragon—Jean E. Pendziwol
• Scaredy Squirrel at Night—Melanie Watt
• Franklin’s Valentines—Paulette Bourgeois
• Big Bear Hug—Nicolas Oldland
• Franklin Plays the Game—Paulette Bourgeois

On top of that, they’re also installing Little Free Libraries in Ronald McDonald Houses across the nation so Canadians can leave a book and take a new one in return to keep that reading love going!

But no one person—or one company—can change things alone. McDonald’s Canada hopes to get other Canadians in on the action, donating up to 20,000 books to Canadian children on behalf of those of us who choose to post a “shelfie”! So all you need to do is take a picture of your bookshelf and post it—hence a “selfie”—with the #OwnABookGiveABook hashtag, and that donates a book to a Canadian child through First Book Canada! And hopefully, we’ll see a whole lot of you get on board to make it all happen!

McDonald’s Canada’s Happy Meals—Now with 100% More Joy of Reading!

Reading’s something we take for granted. It shapes us, connects us, and opens up doors we’d never know about otherwise. Even if you are a parent who dutifully reads to their children every night, know there are those who can’t. And if all it takes is a social media post to help change that situation a positive way, my friends? That is one small price to pay.

Thanks for reading, and I hope to see you invest in our nation’s next generation!

Until the next,

–case p.

Disclaimer: McDonald’s Canada compensated me for this post, but all opinions and ideas are indeed my own!