Relationships-How to Mentor Your Grandchildren

One of the most important roles as a grandparent, is making sure your grandchildren grow up to be productive, contributing members of society. You can help fulfill that role by simply being an example to them, and by being a mentor as well.

Mentoring your grandchildren is not overly difficult, but it does take consistent effort and commitment. You have to decide first of all, that you will be a mentor to your grandchildren, then you must go about taking steps that will ensure you're mentoring them well.

A mentor is simply a trusted teacher or counselor and in order to be a mentor to your own grandchildren, you must first spend time with them. If you're not involved in your grandchildren's lives, you won't know them well enough to help teach and advise them on much of anything in life. If however, you form a strong relationship with your grandchildren from as early an age as possible, you'll be able to take on the mentorship role they'll need and desire.

By being a mentor to your grandchildren, they'll be more likely to come to you with personal problems, or to seek advice on things they may not want to talk to their own parents about. Before this can happen though, there must be strong feelings of trust instilled first. And trust takes time, patience, and effort.

Since mentoring your grandchildren involves both teaching and counseling, there are a number of ways you can attempt to mentor them throughout their lives. Spending time together is essential of course, and a lot of the teaching style mentoring you'll do will happen naturally just from that together time.

If for instance, you're adept at needlework crafts such as crochet, knitting, and quilt making, you can help your grandchildren learn how to do these skills as well. Some grandkids won't have much of an interest during certain times of their lives, namely the pre-teen and teenage years, but if you can start teaching a few basics for these skills while the grandkids are five to ten years old, there's a very good chance they may pick it up again once they're older.

Boys and girls alike can learn needlework skills from their grandparents, and there are a wide variety of other things you can mentor those grandchildren in too. Help them learn to cook for instance, by baking cookies or cupcakes together. Mentor them in the art of math and measuring skills while you're cooking together too. You can also help them learn more about math and different kinds of measuring skills by doing woodworking crafts together, or letting them help you with small home improvement and repair projects around your home or theirs.

You'll soon find that by spending this time together and helping the child learn about various skills and hobbies in the world, they'll talk openly with you. When they do start talking, particularly if they start talking about something personal, or embarrassing, or something they may be struggling for advice on… be sure to listen quietly and attentively.

When your grandchildren start opening up to you as a mentor for advice and counseling, it's important for them to not feel as if you're judging them, or as if you'll be angry and punish them. When kids of any age are afraid of anger and punishment, they clam up and refuse to communicate their thoughts or feelings. When the grandkids aren't communicating with you, it's very difficult to be an effective mentor.