Pair students from a lower elementary class with those in a more advanced grade. The primary-aged children may read familiar titles with buddies. Allow each buddy to take a turn reading, encouraging older elementary school students to introduce new sight words through more advanced pieces of literature while reading to a younger student. The children learn parts of a story, vocabulary meanings and cooperation through the buddy reading program.
Becoming pen pals is an effective activity for learning cooperation and writing skills with a buddy. Grouping one first- or second-grade student with a fourth- or fifth-grade student at the beginning of the year will begin the pen pal buddy writing activity. Each week, during class transition times or within the time set aside to work in the student writing center, the students will write "getting to know you" letters to each other. After a certain number of letters are sent, introduce the buddies and encourage them to play games or take the pair outside to the playground to become more familiar with each other.
Arrange a set time per month that the two classes of buddies may meet in the school's computer lab, if applicable. If the school does not have a designated computer lab and a few computers are available in the classroom or in the library, set a schedule for buddies to use them at different times of the day. The older buddies will be able to teach the younger students the proper techniques to use a computer. Encourage the pairs to play learning games appropriate for the younger students and allow the older buddy to act as a facilitator to the game.
Arrange lesson plan schedules so that both classrooms will be discussing the same themed unit simultaneously. Buddies may teach one another facts about the lesson content instead of only the older students doing the informal instruction. For example, pirate themed units allow the children to devise treasure maps together and play a sunken pirate ship game using math coordinates.