Elementary teachers looking for lesson plans and activities for The Buddy Bench will find this post helpful. It includes resource recommendations, free teaching ideas, and information about the book. You’ll have everything you need to deliver engaging interactive read aloud lessons based on this story.
With themes of inclusion and friendship, this The Buddy Bench picture book by Patty Brozo is a favorite in 1st, 2nd and 3rd grade classrooms. It will be a big hit in your classroom too! Learn more about this book below!
Engage Your Students with The Buddy Bench Lesson Plans & Activities in 3 Easy Steps:
- Read a summary of The Buddy Bench. You can find it in the section below.
- Check out the teaching ideas for reading comprehension strategies, grammar topics and social emotional learning skills that can be taught using this children’s book.
- Download the book companion to make lesson planning simple with The Buddy Bench reading comprehension questions, writing prompts, teaching ideas & no-prep extension activities.
THE BUDDY BENCH SUMMARY
The story The Buddy Bench is about Mrs. Mellon’s class playing outside at recess. There are some kids that have people to play with and others who do not have anyone to play with. Some students are comfortable asking to join in and others are not.
When Jake asks Gabe to play, he creates a chain of people asking to join in who normally are not included. The class learns the importance of inclusion and work with their teacher to create a buddy bench for all to be included.
THE BUDDY BENCH LESSON PLAN IDEAS
Each of our 400+ Starts With a Story book companions come with a teacher’s guide to make lesson planning quick and easy, printable worksheets and digital resources that cover ALL of the standards-based reading comprehension skills.
When it comes to writing lesson plans and finding activities for The Buddy Bench, we’ve already done all of the heavy lifting for you.
We found this book was especially good at teaching the topics listed below.
READING COMPREHENSION QUESTIONS
The text-based The Buddy Bench reading comprehension questions focus on:
- rhyme | rhythm | repetition
- author’s purpose
- making connections
LITERATURE-BASED SOCIAL EMOTIONAL LEARNING LESSONS
We found this story to be a great SEL picture book to promote:
- inclusion
- friendship
GRAMMAR, VOCABULARY & WORD STUDY
- adjectives
- common and proper nouns
- contractions
THE BUDDY BENCH ACTIVITIES
You’ll receive all of the following resources aligned to the story:
- comprehension questions
- 30 writing prompts with themed paper
- vocabulary activities
- word study print & go activities
- ideas for grammar lessons with focus sentence printables
- social emotional learning discussion topics
- graphic organizers to target specific comprehension skills and strategies
YOU HAVE 2 OPTIONS! WHERE WOULD YOU LIKE TO PURCHASE THIS BOOK COMPANION?
BOOK INFO FOR ELEMENTARY TEACHERS
What are the reading levels for The Buddy Bench?
- Lexile® Measure: 520L
- Guided Reading Level: N/A
- DRA Level: N/A
- Accelerated Reader Level (ARC): 3.0
Who is the author? Who is the illustrator?
The book was written by Patty Brozo. It was illustrated by Mike Deas.
What genre is The Buddy Bench?
It is a fiction book. You may want to check out our genre activities or read our blog post, How to Teach Genre to Elementary Students.
How many pages are in the book?
The story is 36 pages long.
