Kids who feel left-out will now have a place to make friends. In Canada, a primary school has introduced a ‘buddy bench’ where kids can go to let others know that they are feeling lonely.

Assistant Principal Rebekah Graham said to the Calgary Herald ‘other students who see a student on the buddy bench will go and invite them into a game or just go chat with them’. She also stated that the bench was a way of giving students a language to reach out to other students to help them to fit in.

One of the young students said that seeing someone on the bench would prompt him to help them to make them feel like they belong. Students have called the bench a ‘friend making machine’.

The school community has adorned the bench with peace signs, rainbows and linked hands.