Our children are experiencing a lot of challenges and meet all different kinds of people in their lives. Some they will want to be friends with and some they won’t. Some of the people will be easy to get along with, and some will be difficult. Usually there is not much you can do to change other people and make them act the way you want them to, but if you can use your energy to work on your own behavior, you can experience great success in getting along with others.

Mentoring with Art is a program that teaches children, grades 1-6, coping skills in order to thrive in society. Sessions will take place in the form of support groups of 4-8 learners. Mentoring with Art is not a counseling program, but an educational program, biblically based. Although the program has therapeutic value the focus will be on learning new behavioral and coping skills in group format, combined with art. The art part of the program will not consist of doing craft projects or stick-figure-style drawing, but will consist of structured lessons to teach them to draw in realistic styles and creating sculptured structures. Drawing and sculpturing also have the important advantage of being considered fun and play. It’s not considered a “serious subject”, like math or reading, but is free of most of the baggage related to fear of failure and anxiety around academic success.

This program consists of different classes that a learner can enroll in such as children from divorced families, children who have experienced the death of a loved one, positive self-image or assertiveness. Classes will start the first week in September and will meet on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays at 3:30pm in the boys side of the Gold Rush trailer. For more information or questions, please contact Thea Loubser at 437.0132 or 240.9367.