Our Impact
Growing Impact. One Family at a Time.
12,456
Families
Served
20,072
Children
Reached
323,856
Books Placed in Homes
7
Communities Participating
Behind every number is a child and a family building a stronger foundation for reading.
imagineOne starts during the critical birth-to-five years, equipping families with the tools, knowledge, and support to help prepare their children for reading.
Every Child Reading Ready Before Kindergarten.
Prevention Changes Outcomes
Most literacy efforts begin after a child struggles.
imagineOne starts before.
From birth to age five, children are rapidly building the language and early literacy foundations that reading will depend on later.
The Reading Ready System™ puts families at the center, combining:
TOOLS
Books and practical resources families can use at home.
KNOWLEDGE
Simple guidance that helps families understand how everyday interactions build language and reading readiness.
SUPPORT
Childcare providers, educators, and communities helping families access and use those tools.
Together, these pieces help build strong foundations before kindergarten and before reading struggles begin.
Impact Begins at Home
For many children, My First Steps to Reading® becomes a home library they can call their own.
But books are only part of the story.
Families also receive practical guidance for turning everyday moments into opportunities for learning through:
Talking. Singing. Reading. Playing. Connecting.
These simple interactions help build language, vocabulary, curiosity, connection, and the foundations children need for reading.
Childcare providers and educators reinforce the learning. Communities help make the tools and support accessible.
FEATURED IMPACT STORIES
Impact in Action
Impact looks different in every community.
Sometimes it begins in a classroom. Sometimes at a well-child visit. Sometimes with a book bag going home with a family.
What connects these efforts is a shared goal:
Give families the tools, knowledge, and support to help their children become Reading Ready.
BUTLER COUNTY PENNSYLVANIA HEAD START
READING READY
Families and Educators Learning Together
At Early Learning Connections Head Start, educator Arlene Roth has used My First Steps to Reading® for more than 20 years to help children build letter recognition, vocabulary, language, and early reading skills.
In the classroom, children learn through books, songs, picture cards, conversation, writing, and hands-on activities.
Then the learning goes home.
Families receive My First Steps to Reading® to keep, while teachers share book titles, songs, and ideas families can use together.
WHAT EDUCATORS ARE SEEING
“I see so much growth in the kiddos with letter recognition, writing, and even letter sounds!”
Arlene Roth
Head Start Teacher
This is what happens when educators and families work together: children experience familiar learning and language experiences at school and at home.
DESERT SANDS UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT
READING READY
In Riverside County California, Desert Sands Unified School District’s Transitional Kindergarten classrooms, teachers use My First Steps to Reading® to introduce a new letter each week. Read-alouds, songs, and hands-on practice build alphabet knowledge and early phonemic awareness.
Every participating family takes home their own toolkit, with books, songs, and guidance. Teachers help families see how simple interactions at home can reinforce language and reading readiness.
The Impact:
Children experience consistent support between school and home, while families gain books, ideas, and practical ways to reinforce learning together.
GREATER MANKATO, MINNESOTA
A READING READY COMMUNITY
This is where imagineOne's community model began.
Families are at the center, surrounded by trusted partners who help make reading readiness part of everyday community life.
Key partners:
Mankato Area Rotary — Community funding, awareness, volunteer engagement, and family support.
Mankato Clinic — Helping families understand the importance of language development and reading readiness during well-child visits.
Mankato Area Public Schools — Connecting children and families with books, resources, and early learning support.
Blue Earth County Library — Providing access to books, programs, and family resources.
Families in the Mankato Area — Every family in our Reading Ready community receives the 26-book set of My First Steps to Reading® toolkit, plus training and access to events that turn everyday moments into learning.
This is what it looks like when a community surrounds families with support.
BETHANY LITERACY CLINIC
imagineOne focuses on prevention, but some children need help now. That's why we help fund the Bethany Literacy Clinic at Bethany Lutheran College. Struggling readers get structured literacy instruction rooted in the science of reading and see measurable gains in fluency and comprehension.
One Child Becomes Thousands.
imagineOne began with a simple idea:
Imagine making a difference in one child's life.
We believe lasting change begins one child at a time, one family at a time.
When families have the tools and knowledge to build strong early foundations, a child's future can change.
When childcare providers, educators, healthcare partners and communities surround families with support, impact grows.
Today, thousands of families and children are part of that story.
And we're just getting started.
One child. One family. One community at a time.
Join the Reading Ready Revolution™
We’re making reading readiness joyful, simple, and possible for every family.
This revolution isn’t a fight. It’s fun.
And every community has a part to play.
Bring families, childcare providers, educators, healthcare partners, libraries, civic organizations, businesses, and community leaders together around one shared goal:
Every Child Reading Ready Before Kindergarten.
We don’t have to wait for children to struggle with reading.
We can start before the struggle begins.