Unit Plan

Getting the Best Out of Book Buddies

By  Jacquylynn Brickman
  • Grades: 3–5

Overview

Mentoring younger readers is a common strategy schools use to build community across grade levels. In addition to the social stimulation, well-planned Book Buddy sessions can serve as a learning point for students. This unit couples social interaction with literacy activities that can be used in cross grade level student partnerships.

Objective

Students will:

  1. Create a student-friendly definition for “mentor”
  2. Identify Traits of Success that a mentor displays
  3. Describe how they will be a mentor to their primary Book Buddy
  4. Examine literature of emergent readers
  5. Categorize types of common primary literature (i.e. wordless, pattern, alphabet, number, rhyme, etc.).
  6. Write a book about themselves using one of the identified types of literature
  7. Utilize the writing process when writing the book
  8. Apply the “Traits of Success” when they read their story aloud to their Book Buddy

Lesson Plans for this Unit

Culminating Activity

At our school, the partnership between Book Buddies continues throughout the year. Therefore, we celebrate at the end of the year with an outside activity, such as a field trip or picnic. If you are doing this unit without the Book Buddy component, having the students read their stories aloud to peers is a nice celebratory event.

Supporting Books

Books for Book Buddy Reading

  • Part of Collection:
    Units That Boost Reading and Writing Skills
  • Subjects:
    Cooperation and Teamwork, Literature, Story Elements, Literature Appreciation, Autobiographical Writing, Writing Process, Class Projects, Understanding Self and Others
  • Skills:
    Reading, Descriptive Writing, Expository Writing
  • Duration:
    2 Weeks
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