The Buddy Bench

Written by Patty Brozo · Illustrated by Mike Deas

Kids transform loneliness into friendship with a simple bench on the playground.

3.9 Goodreads · 307 ratings

36 pages· 705 words· Est. 6 min read-aloud· 520L

$17.95Save 5%

In stock. Also at Amazon or Bookshop.

Bookroo's summary

On a lively playground, children notice the loneliness of their peers and decide to make a change. They convince their teacher to install a buddy bench, a place where sitting signals a need for friendship. As they soar on imaginary planes and tame dragons, these kids learn the power of empathy and inclusion. Will their efforts turn solitude into companionship and change the playground forever? Discover how a simple bench can transform lives and inspire a movement of kindness.

From the publisher

A school playground can be a solitary place for a kid without playmates; in one survey, 80 percent of 8- to 10-year-old respondents described being lonely at some point during a school day. Patty Brozo’s cast of kids brings a playground to raucous life, and Mike Deas’s illustrations invest their games with imaginary planes to fly, dragons to tame, and elephants to ride. And these kids match their imaginations with empathy, identifying and swooping up the lonely among them.Buddy benches are appearing in schoolyards around the country. Introduced from Germany in 2014, the concept is simple: When a child sits on the bench, it’s a signal to other kids to ask him or her to play.

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