Why is Mentoring Important for Kids?
In the Big Brothers Big Sisters program, we find mentors to help our community’s youth develop into happy, resilient persons who fulfill their human potential. Mentoring kids helps them experience new things, develop emotionally, avoid negative behaviors, and achieve lifelong success.
Keep reading below to learn why mentoring is important for kids.
Mentoring Kids Gives New Experiences
Spending time with a mentor often involves going out and trying new activities. Some mentors go to theme parks, go rock climbing or explore different parks. Some get their nails done with their Big and try new activities that align with their interests.
Trying new activities, places, and events gives the child more confidence in their ability to explore later in life. It helps them learn how to adapt to new situations and experiences.
Mentoring Youth Aids Emotional Development
As children grow older, their amygdala develops. The amygdala is the part of the brain that creates and controls emotional responses. With kids, the part of the amygdala that creates emotional responses develops before the part that regulates those responses.
Due to this inconsistency between emotions and regulating those emotions, children sometimes act out. They may say the wrong thing and get more upset easily. It’s not because they’re a bad kid, but because their brain hasn’t finished developing yet. A mentor is there to meet them where they’re at. How a mentor reacts to situations in front of the kid and helps the kid shows the child how to regulate and control their emotional responses.
Mentoring Can Avoid Negative Behavior
Mentors provide positive role models for kids. So much of the media is consumed with poor life choices and glorifying risky behaviors. For young children who can be easily influenced, they may assume that such behavior is harmless. These kids can also feel uncool for not taking part. This is especially true when some of their peers in school are beginning to try out different risky behaviors.
Having a role model that the child can look up to lets them see there’s more to life than underage drinking, illegal drugs, risky sexual activities, and other negative behaviors. It shows them a positive example of what life can be like.
Mentors are a Great Source of Impartial Advice
When a child wants to talk to their parents about a problem, the parents are likely to answer a certain way. Oftentimes, the child can guess how their parent is going to react to a problem. The same goes for their friends, teachers, and church leaders.
Talking to a mentor who isn’t connected to their situation gives the child an outlet to discuss the issues they’re facing. Mentors can offer impartial advice and discuss similar situations they’ve faced. Mentors provide reliable guidance.
Mentors Help Youth Achieve Success
Mentors and the kids they mentor are usually at different places in their lives. The kid may be as young as six years old and learning how to make friends. They may be learning how to succeed in school while balancing family and friends. Mentors, on the other hand, may already be established in their careers or going through college. They know what their Little is going through and have lived through that stage of their lives before.
Therefore, the mentor can provide critical advice to help the kid through that difficult time of their life. Whether it’s how to deal with friend drama in middle school to dealing with bullies, a mentor can provide valuable feedback and advice.
They can also provide a long-term view of how situations may turn out. It’s easy for a middle schooler or high schooler to believe that the struggles of youth will last forever and will still matter in the years to come. A mentor can show them that these struggles won’t matter in 10, 15, or 20 years. Mentors foster a brighter outlook.
Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Inland Northwest
At Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Inland Northwest, we empower our youth through mentorship. Our mission is to create and support one-to-one mentoring relationships that ignite the power and promise of youth. Learn more about how to join our mission to help youth through becoming a youth mentor or making a donation to youth mentorship programs.