It’s not what you should do, but what you want to do!
Mentees and mentors should have fun. They should do things that build character and set positive examples. The opportunities are endless, but we’ve compiled a list of ideas to help mentors struggling with first things to do together:
General
- Cooking or baking
- Having lunch or dinner
- Shopping
- Playing board or video games
- Making crafts or art
- Working on cars or bikes
- Scrapbooking
- Walking dogs or tending to pets at the Humane Society
- Learning photography
- Doing a simple woodworking project
- Learning to knit, crochet, or sew
- Visiting each others’ faith community
- Volunteering for a local cause
- Sending each other letters
- Journaling
- Carving or painting pumpkins together
- Making creative presents
- Writing stories or poems together
- Going to a high school play
- Going to a sporting event
- Attending concerts
- Watching your favorite films
- Planting a tree or garden
- Going on a scavenger hunt around town
- Making New Year’s Resolutions or goals for each other
- Building a model together
Fitness and health
- Swimming
- Bicycling
- Skating/rollerblading
- Ice skating
- Bowling
- Canoeing/boating
- Sledding
- Hiking
- Fishing
- Playing catch
- Frisbee golf
- Regular golf
- Horseback riding
- Hunting
- Learning karate
- Yoga, Zumba, or other group fitness class
- Snowboarding or skiing
- Rock-climbing
- Working out together
- Walk/run in a 5K
Academic, career, and life skills
- Doing homework
- Reading a book and discussing it
- Watching the movie adaptation of a book
- Working on a resume
- Talking about career interests
- Talking about college
- Visiting a local college
- Working on college applications
- Practicing job interview skills
- Money management
- Going to the library
- Investigating the pros and cons of credit cards
- Taking a class together
- Looking for jobs or internships
- Touring the mentor’s workplace
- Talking about how to balance work and life
- Prepping for the upcoming school year
- Making a list of colleges to research
- Talking about the mentor’s first job
- Talking about online presence and social media
- Learning about online banking
- Talking about news and current events
- Developing a portfolio to showcase your skills
- Talking about the future
- Talking about taxes
Cultural destinations around Central Indiana
- Going to a museum
- Going to an amusement park
- Going to the State or County Fair
- Attending a community festival
- Attending a fundraiser
- Attending a sporting event together
- Visiting the Indianapolis Zoo
- Going to a show (flower show, auto show, dog show, etc.)
- Visiting a State Park
- Going on a haunted hayride or visiting a corn maze
“He showed that confidence to others.”
The following transcript was generated with the help of AI. Accuracy is not guaranteed.
At first I thought that it was going to be boring and that it’s just going to be a waste of my time and that this person is never going to be as close to me as my family is. I thought it was going to be boring. I thought it was going to be like a counselor and stuff like that. And I just thought it wasn’t going to be like entertaining or we weren’t going to do anything fun. [MUSIC] It is nothing like that. As soon as they met me, they treated me like family. And they invited me in and just made it easier for me to like go like accept being in there. Once I got to know her she became more like a grandparent to me. She’s welcomed me into her family. She spends a lot of money on me when she doesn’t have to and I love her. She’s like my grandparent. When I first met him my mom took a photo of me and him because I was standing on a chair beside him so I can match his height. Went to a couple of those trainings and there was times that you said you know there was gonna be rough patches or whatever. Well I mean Marion’s been great like you can’t have an easier-going guy than him. My mom’s a single mother and she’s blind and she does everything to care for me and I try my best to help her. Sometimes she has diabetic attacks and I have to help her get through that. Sometimes I’m like stressed at home then he picks me up from my house and we go do something fun and it relieves all that stress. He’s kind of growing up in the area with me and with my kids. He’s hard not to be part of the family. His family is like a second family to me because his kids are like nieces and nephews to me and it’s funny because I watched some of his kids grow up. He’s like a second father figure to me and he helps me through a lot. If you’re on the fence, there’s lots of things we do that don’t matter this much. However you want to look at it, but we do a lot of things that are surely for our enjoyment and fun. While we can have fun, this is more important. [MUSIC] [Music] (music fades) [Music].