Quality Content Writers Group
An unexpected side effect of my mentoring this year
by Cheryl Baumgartner Medical Billing/Coding/Insurance
Cheryl Baumgartner 
Medical...
One of the accomplishments I'm most proud of in my life is the time I spend mentoring children. I spent the last half of the school year mentoring a wonderful young man at a local elementary school. One of our regular activities was reading.
This had a bit of a side effect on me, a renewed interest in children's books. My favorite children's author is Dr. Seuss and we went though quite a few of his books, Green Eggs and Ham, The Cat in the Hat and also some of him more advanced books such as The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins. But I also was exposed to the Little Golden books again and also some new authors. The biggest change is that I went back to reading these books again.
Reading them now as an adult I can appreciate the lessons these books contain in a new way. Not only do they stimulate the imagination, but they can also be great learning tools for us adults. It's amazing how simple yet profound many of these books can be. I now read a lot more children's books. I do have two granddaughters and I try to read books before I buy them. That way I know if it will interest them and what they story is about. Sometimes I will learn something new myself or get a reminder lesson on something I learned long ago that just sort of got pushed to the back of my mind by "adult" concerns.
I challenge everyone to take the time to read to a child. It's quality bonding time, and it helps improve literacy among our children. Which is a major concern with the internet becoming a major part of our children's lives from youngest childhood. I think we should all be more like Henry Bemis, the main character in one of my favorite Twilight zone episodes.
Jul 6th 2008 11:19
Medical...One of the accomplishments I'm most proud of in my life is the time I spend mentoring children. I spent the last half of the school year mentoring a wonderful young man at a local elementary school. One of our regular activities was reading.
This had a bit of a side effect on me, a renewed interest in children's books. My favorite children's author is Dr. Seuss and we went though quite a few of his books, Green Eggs and Ham, The Cat in the Hat and also some of him more advanced books such as The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins. But I also was exposed to the Little Golden books again and also some new authors. The biggest change is that I went back to reading these books again.
Reading them now as an adult I can appreciate the lessons these books contain in a new way. Not only do they stimulate the imagination, but they can also be great learning tools for us adults. It's amazing how simple yet profound many of these books can be. I now read a lot more children's books. I do have two granddaughters and I try to read books before I buy them. That way I know if it will interest them and what they story is about. Sometimes I will learn something new myself or get a reminder lesson on something I learned long ago that just sort of got pushed to the back of my mind by "adult" concerns.
I challenge everyone to take the time to read to a child. It's quality bonding time, and it helps improve literacy among our children. Which is a major concern with the internet becoming a major part of our children's lives from youngest childhood. I think we should all be more like Henry Bemis, the main character in one of my favorite Twilight zone episodes.
Jul 6th 2008 11:19
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Comments
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Arthur Webster
 Just plain honestyHi, Cheryl, Stop 'mentoring' children! Play with children, learn with children, learn from children, acknowledge your own inner child and forget that you are supposed to be an adult. Children deserve more than a mentor and I am sure that this is not really what you meant when you used the word. Children deserve friends, they deserve time, they deserve encouragement, they deserve correction, they deserve joy but, most of all, they deserve for you to be who you are. While you are being a mentor, you cannot be who you are because the very word precludes the idea. I don't spend so much time with children nowadays but, because they taught me so much about spontaneity and fun, I am able to take a child like pleasure in most things that I do. We adults take ourselves much too seriously - don't be a mentor - PLAY! You will learn more of importance from a child at play than is written in all the books in all the world. Jul 7th 2008 01:26 |
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Cheryl Baumgartner
Medical Billing/Coding/InsuranceMy mentoring has a specific gaol. That does not mean We don't play with them too but the goal of what we do is to help these children not only with the schoolwork they already have but to foster a love of learning in them. All of the children we work with are "at risk" and most of them have adults in their lives incapable of setting the right example for what ever reason. A big part of the job is setting the right example and it takes much more than play to accomplish our goals. Jul 7th 2008 07:48 |
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Arthur Webster
Just plain honestyAhhh. So you are a teacher! Much more sensible. Jul 8th 2008 09:48 |
Although I've seen the Dr Seuss and Little Golden Books, I don't believe
I've read any of them. Comes of having no children, I guess, but some
children's books DO have messages worth learning.
Jul 6th 2008 17:16