Ideas for mentoring younger kids

More power to you - I ran a girl scout troop of 4th-6th graders for a year, and then moved on.  And these were "good kids", and I had helpers! 

But I found that one of the things that would help (assuming you don't have the girl with severe untreated ADHD like I did) is working on crafts together.  It gives them something (a) to do, (b) to have, and (c) provides some structure that makes conversation seem more natural.  We put together "stress buster" boxes, made cosmetics (check the local craft stores), collages. We also did a lot of outdoor things, like hiking on local trails, orienteering and geocaching.  For the more "active" kids, giving them a map and compass along with some basic instructions goes a long way to both building a sense of competence as well as providing an outlet to just talk about life.

If you go to a scouting website, or even just look for ideas from scout leaders, you will find more ideas than you can shake a stick at.  Mrs gearboy still works with both brownies and seniors (yes, she is involved with 2 troops, despite having our youngest away in college for the last 2 years).

Seriously, candy bars??  I know that candy is a great influence and such, but that's promoting bad eating habits, IMO.
There's got to be a better reward, somehow, and since I have boys, I don't have a clue on what would work for the girls.  I would have them write down 10 of their favorite things and see if something small (like rubberstamping) is mentioned and can be purchased, relatively cheap, too.

Thanks for taking your time and helping to be an influence to these kids!

Edited by 1stTimeTri 2010-11-30 2:38 PM

You won't have to do much.  I have spent loads of time in classrooms with my little guys and interacting with all the other kids in the classes. They come from all different backgrounds, but the ones that get the least attention at home will get pretty attached to you if you just pay attention to them. They will tell you all kinds of stories and let you get to know them pretty easily, I think.
Can you exercise with them? Go for a run around the school? How about a book club?

Thanks so much for the ideas. Checking out scouting activities is a great idea. I was definitely thinking of trying to do little projets with them to get them thinking and interacting and something that we as a group of four could do.

And Jess, you are probably right about them willing to talk to me since I will be someone who has an interest in them. Just meeting them today they seemed to speak easily to me and not clam up. Like I said, this is uncharted territory for me, so it has me nervous about doing everything right and saying all the right things, but I think it's probably like that adoption commercial I see on TV, "It doesn't take a perfect person to be a perfect parent." Hope it applies to mentors as well

First, THANK YOU for trying to help out. 

The first step is to build an honest rapport with them.  If you're going to be there every Tuesday, tell them, and then be there for them.  Then, when you're there, really be "with" them.  Chat a bit about what you do (work and hobbies) and let them talk about what they *like* to do for fun. 

You can show genuine interest without bribing them with candy bars or bookmarks, and until you better understand each of them, these token gifts will be received more as bribes than gifts.  To an uncooperative reader, that bookmark is a spotlight on their "bad" behavior of not reading. 

You can foster a bit of discussion and start to build some common interest by asking them to help you solve a work-related problem.  You're a civil engineer...roads?  Ask them what they like about riding in a car and what they think they'd like about driving when they're old enough.  Would they be excited to "drive" an car that drives itself?  Give them some open-ended questions and be very careful to remain non-judgemental at their responses.  (This may be the first time they've ever gotten a non-judgemental response to an opinion.) 

Edited to add:  Once you've established the rapport, Scouting has some great resources. 

Edited by McFuzz 2010-11-30 6:05 PM

Kudos to you for volunteering!  Kids that age really like adult attention, so getting them to talk and interact shouldn't be too hard.  Fourth grade is a great age for girls.  They are fearless and ready for any challenge.  Talk to them a little about running and see if they are interested.  That would also work towards the self-esteem issue, which I'm sure is lurking around somewhere.  I teach 9th grade and I see every day that there are lots of messed up kids out there.  Any positive interaction at-risk kids can get has got to help in some way. 

Here's the first website in mrs gearboy's file on our computer for girl scouts - personalized journals.
http://www.creativity-portal.com/howto/a/violette/journal-cover.html

You can get them talking about things, then they can also use the journal to spark more ideas and more discussions later.  I remember when I had the kids making a similar thing ("coping toolkits", where they used magazine pictures to cover shoe-box sized boxes that we then put things in to de-stress, like crayons, or pictures of fun things and places - mrs gearboy decorated one that she put a picture of her bike on), they would all talk about the things that gave them stress (like siblings, school, parents, etc) as well as sharing ideas about what helped. 

Don't be afraid to be passionate about what you care about, and be genuinely interested in them.  You'll find that makes it all easier than you think.

Will you be working with the 3 of them all together or ever separately?  I think that makes a difference.  If together, the dynamic may be weirder at first.  They are watching each other as well as you.  But you will get there soon enough.

Here's something super easy I do if I'm ever going to be around girls 9-12: have a loop of yarn in your pocket.  For cat's cradle.  Seriously.  You just make the cat's cradle and someone will want to play.  With 3 girls, you have an extra loop in the pocket and pretty soon everyone is playing in pairs.  It takes 5 seconds and suddenly you have people sitting very close together, doing something with their hands, and working collaboratively.

I can't even tell you the number of times having a couple of loops of yarn in my pocket has helped me with pre-teen girls.

Hand-clapping games do the same thing.  (Miss Mary Mac, Mac Mac - All dressed in black, black, black...)  You might think those are just for younger girls, but pre-teens  enjoy them.  Plus, girls from different regions and racial backgrounds learn different songs, or slightly different lyrics to the same song, so you can teach each other.  (Same for jump-rope lyrics by the way!)

Oh if they are physically active types jumping rope is good too.

That's all for starters.  If later you can sucker them into reading, you get a second gold medal.  I had a huge breakthrough while I was out seeing the new Harry Potter with two 13-year-old girls this past weekend.  Two of us had read the books, and the third (a "reluctant reader") had just started reading the first.  She commented that even just the beginning of the book is giving her a lot of background detail she didn't know, despite having seen all of the movies multiple times.  As we discussed the series afterward, the non-reader moaned, "you guys know so much MORE than I do!"  On the drive home, I casually offered to lend her the rest of my books and pointed out that if she reads one a month she'll finish them all by the time the next movie comes out.  She texted me a reminder to bring Book #2 on Sunday and now determined to read all 7 by June.   Bwah-ha-ha-ha!

And: it's AWESOME you are doing this!   The first gold medal is for that.

I love the journal idea! I'm thinking I may get one for each of the girls and myself included. In it, each day they can record their 'color' for the day (they have a color ranking system based on behavior, green being the best, red being the worst), how they feel that day (simple like happy, sad, tired, angry) and then write something short about something they did that day (like played kickball in PE). They could write or depict in pictures. Then, when we meet, we can share them so that I can learn about how they are doing each day and will hopefully be more connected to them. And by me having a little journal, they can learn about my day to day things too. Then, perhaps we can discuss about why a certain day they received a bad color and ways they could have done things differently. Would this be too much for them? I'm not looking for them to go into depth about journaling every detail of their day, just something simple to get them active and thinking and a way for them to tell me about their week/troubles rather than getting it from the teacher. I'd request that they keep them at school so that they don't lose them.

That is a good point. The teacher said that these kids don't think/look beyond where they are currently, they have no dreams/goals. So, I'd like to encourage them to think about looking ahead and setting goals too. Perhaps, I could have them focus on a topic each week, such as what they might want to be when they grow up, what sport they might like to play in middle school, or musical instrument they might like to play and then talk about ways to achieve those things.

Probably not true, but a common coping mechanism is to suppress those dreams/goals as unlikely to come true.  If you can help them identify and nurture those dreams/goals, you'll have done well! 

I think journals are an awesome idea!  I used to work with inner city kids of all ages.  The 4th grade girls really like making collages and friendship bracelets.  There are some cool books out there that can teach you how to make lots of different patterns...you can put beads on them.  And, like others have said, they'll just be happy to get some attention from you.  

You are awesome for doing this!  Looking forward to hearing how it goes. 

Oh yeah, friendship bracelets!  We still have a ton of hemp and yarn from those activities!  And my younger daughter used it when she was a camp counselor this past summer - it's a great activity to keep them active and talking at the same time!

I like the friendship bracelet idea and had thought about that too. My sister and I LOVED making things like that when we were younger.

I hate that I will only get to meet with them a couple times (plus their Christmas party) before the Christmas break. My mom suggested getting their addresses and sending them little notes so that they would know that I was thinking about them even when we couldn't get together to meet. I'm not sure if the school is allowed to give out their address info though, but I will see.

These are some good ideas.  I am an elementary chool PE teacher and I have been asked to mentor kids because lots of our kids do not have good male role models.  It is tough for me to turn of the teacher for some of these kids because there attitude is bad.  I have one kid now who has puched a treacher, taken a number 2 in the urinal, cussed teachers, multiple fights, etc and he is in the first grade.  I think I am going to find a sports related puzzel and set it up in my office on an empty table.  I plan on giving him some time working the puzzle.  After I see he is having fun I will give him more time based on a points system we set up together.  I am just talking outloud based on some of the responces in this thread.

The journal is also a great idea.  If you do this you may let the teacher know if they are writing in it.  During a "free writing" assignment they could use the journal to complete the assignment if they are not able to think of something else to do. 

Keep the suggestions coming

Just wanted to update and say that the journals were a big hit! They were excited and wanted to fill them in right then. I discussed with the teacher what I wanted them to do each day and she was fine with it. We'll see next week if they followed through with it or not. Two of my three girls were already in trouble today and the teacher said that the whole class was quite unruly today. I think everyone is getting ready for the break. So, right now, I more just want to try to set a foundation for how we will do things and then hope to make more progress after the Christmas break.

I had a lot of fun today though and am really looking forward to getting to know these girls better.