By JAN LARSON McLAUGHLIN
BG Independent News
School recess is supposed to be a fun break from the confines of the classroom for elementary students. But for some kids, the playground is a lonely place.
It was like that for Aleksander Ostrowski, a third grader at Kenwood Elementary School in Bowling Green.
“Aleks came to me and said he had no one to play with and just walked around” during recess, said his dad Chris Ostrowski.
So the Ostrowski family started thinking about how to make the school playground a friendlier place for kids. They had heard about Buddy Benches before, and started doing some research. The bench idea got started in the U.S. by a 10-year-old boy named Christian Bucks who was apprehensive about moving to Germany for his dad’s job. One of the schools there had a buddy bench – a place where a child could sit if he had no one to play with, and other kids would take it as a signal to ask him to play.
Christian ended up not moving to Germany, but he did start spreading the Buddy Bench concept across the U.S.
And soon, each elementary in Bowling Green may have its own Buddy Bench.
“I want all the elementaries to do it,” Chris Ostrowski said, since every school undoubtedly has children facing the awkward problem of having no one to play with during recess. The benches are intended to give kids a safe, nonjudgmental place to retreat, and to encourage other kids to reach out to them.
“It really teaches kids the importance of social interaction – the inclusion, the tolerance,” Ostrowski said.
The idea for the benches has actually been brewing a while at Kenwood Elementary. Physical education teacher Jeremy Koehler and Jennifer Ostrowski, Aleks’ mom and a teacher at the school, had been discussing the possibility of getting a bench for about four years.
The problem of children feeling left out and alone on the playground is nothing new, Koehler said.
“I’m 27 and it was an issue when I was in elementary school,” Koehler said.
But the issue was money, since each bench with concrete pads costs about $1,000.
“We weren’t sure where we would get the funding,” Koehler said. But together, the Ostrowskis and Koehler made a plan. Chris Ostrowski started talking to businesses and looking at fundraising, and Koehler approached the school district’s superintendent and elementary principals.
The plan is to put two benches each at Kenwood, Crim and Conneaut elementaries, and one each at St. Aloysius, Bowling Green Montessori and Bowling Green Christian Academy. The total cost is estimated at $9,954.
Home Depot has offered a special price on the steel benches that have the words “Buddy Bench” cut into the back. Charles Mohr Concrete has volunteered to pour pads for each of the benches. Chris Ostrowski said a Go Fund Me account may be set up to help with the project.
Koehler said the schools hope to hold kick-off assemblies once the benches are in place, and instruct the kids on how to use them.
The website for Christian’s Buddy Bench suggests the following rules:
- Before you sit on the Buddy Bench, think of something you would like to do. Ask someone else to play with you.
- The bench isn’t for socializing. Only sit there if you can’t find anyone to play with.
- While you’re sitting on the bench, look around for a game you can join.
- If you see something you want to do or a friend you want to talk to, get off the bench.
- When you see someone on the bench, ask that person to play with you.
- If you’re sitting on the bench, play with the first classmate who invites you.
- Keep playing with your new friends.
There is also a “Beyond the Bench” training program designed to encourage children to work on inclusion, empathy, sharing, compassion and conflict resolution.
Koehler said it can be tough for kids at schools like Kenwood, where some of the students come from communities outside Bowling Green like Rudolph or Milton Center.
“They don’t necessarily get to see each other outside of school,” he said. But something as simple as a Buddy Bench can help.
“It helps kids make new friends. It helps them with their self-image,” Koehler said. “It helps to bring out the best in kids.”
And as far as Aleks, well, he said he doesn’t need the bench himself anymore since he started his own nature club for kids on the playground. But maybe he can find a couple more club members sitting on the Buddy Bench someday.
