WESTWOOD — The children sitting around the table with Anna Cannoy think of her as their friend, their big sister and their teacher, all at the same time.

On the four mornings a week the Fairview High School senior comes to their third-grade class at the district’s elementary school, they read a story or she reads to them, and they discuss the story.

On Fridays, she isn’t there. That’s one thing the students don’t like about Fridays, said their teacher, Kim Stambaugh.

Their fondness for Cannoy and their reading sessions are so complete they bring out a doll with long dark hair like hers and read to it on those days, Stambaugh said.

That is the kind of impression 25 students in Fairview’s student leadership class have made since they began their mentorship project in August. Working with students on every grade level, they are helping the elementary implement its new whole-school reading concentration initiative while learning valuable lessons about responsibility, patience, problem solving and group management.

To promote reading and boost scores, the elementary this year dedicates a period every morning to reading. A peek into any classroom reveals children with books open, either reading or listening to an adult read, or talking over what they have just read.

That is where the leadership group comes in. “When you do something so wholeheartedly, you need extra hands,” district reading specialist Tracy Moresea said.

They’ve been at it since mid-August, when they enrolled in the elective class knowing there would be a project but not knowing what it would be. Since then they have embraced the job and seldom have to be coached on what to do when their bus arrives at the elementary in the morning.

Fanning out to classrooms across the building, they get started with a minimum of bustle. “They come in prepared, like they’d done it their whole lives,” Stambaugh said.

The project works because younger children naturally look up to the older ones, and the high-school students respond to that.

“The kids are engaged and they are so excited. These students are like superheroes to the elementary kids. And the high-school kids get attached and they understand the importance of the job,” Moresea said.

Back at the high school, their class sessions lay the groundwork for the field experience, according to Angie Reihs, their teacher.

Class discussions on leadership characteristics and high-profile executives including American presidents bring some perspective to the mentoring experience.

For many in her class it’s already part of their makeup. “They’re the leaders of our school. Very few of them are go-with-the-crowd people,” she said.

They have learned that becoming a role model brings with it a responsibility they carry with them even after they leave the classroom, especially in a small, tightly knit community like Westwood.

J.P. Payne, for instance, is a football player so the children he reads with in the morning are likely to see him on the field Friday nights, and out in the community during the week. “I have to be a leader on the field and I want to be a leader to them. ... It’s a great privilege and it gives me the courage to set a better example for the younger kids,” he said.

MIKE JAMES can be reached at mjames@dailyindependent.com or (606) 326-2652.