The article demonstrates mechanisms of empathy of junior students during the lessons of literary reading. The results of the experimental 281 study of level-forming characteristics of empathy are presented according to the literary development of the child-reader, carried out on a sample group of first-graders (N = 24; gymnasium № 1 Saratov) using diagnostic tools: the method of projective type «Yabloko» (Apple) by A. F. Panteleev, the method of diagnostic techniques of literary development M. P. Voyushina (based on the story N.
