Mentor Reflective Essay

This semester I learned many techniques and lessons regarding how to become a better mentor. Some of the major lessons I learned were related to how I communicated and led others. I learned that I am a leader in the exploration stage and a considerate communicator. Learning these facts about myself help me cater my style of communicating to different mentees and how to recognize how other people see me in the leadership role of mentor. Learning how to find out about how you communicate and about the leadership model in class gave me tools to work on myself as well as tools for me to pass on to my mentees.
I also learned that the students I serve will come from all different kinds of backgrounds, and represent diversity on many levels. I also learned that I have to cater my meetings to their specific needs, and to ask about …show more content…
I originally thought that by just being there for someone you were a mentor. I now know through this program that mentoring involves giving both tools and advice to effectively help your mentee. The relationship with a mentee is somewhat different than a relationship between friends. There is a sort of bond that occurs from helping the student but the student holds you to higher standards than a friend would.
I am excited about mentoring next semester because I want to hone my mentoring skills even further be able to help my mentees in a more effective way. By critically looking at my mentoring habits I hope to be more accessible to my mentees and to be a better planner of my meetings.
Before training at the beginning of the semester, I thought mentoring was just about giving advice. I now know that it is way more than that. You do give advice but you also have to give tools to constructively help students. You have to have an action plan and SMART goals for the student to measure their progress, otherwise you would have no idea how your student is doing, or if you were helping them or