The thirteen Teaching Videos of JOYW's Mentor Training are:

Teaching Video 1: Re-making an Ancient Container 

We begin with an inspiring vision of the Ancient Container which holds the our mentees in a Coming of Age or Empowerment Circle. We form the container in turn and are held. Then onto a survey of the practical picture of the circle process including community, schedule, preparation, rhythm, leadership, inner work, and some examples of what a Circle looks like for different aged mentees. You’ll digest the top-level view of the key elements of structuring a multi-month Mentoring Circle that is safe, on-message, effective, energized, and enspirited.

Teaching Video 2:
Map of Well-being: Physical, Emotional, and Social  

In a Coming of Age Circle, mentees are empowered to take responsibility for these three facets of their well-being.  Physical well-being is the foundation; you may choose to include anything from building a fire, to growing a garden, to financial literacy to body literacy.  Circles for younger mentees too are developed with this map as a guide; the intended outcomes and experiential aims are less weighty but no less engaging and empowering.  You’ll know the scope of each of the four facets of well-being, and what types of activities and teaching messages support them.

Teaching Video 3:
Rhythm

Rhythm is the friend of a Mentoring Circle in so many ways.  In this session, you’ll discover the rhythm of gathering – how often you meet, how long you meet, and where you meet – affects the energy and effectiveness of a Mentoring Circle, and how this varies by the age of the girls. You’ll learn ways of attending to the space in between gatherings: how to stay connected and fruitful through check ins, tasks and (for older girls) challenges.  Most of all, you will learn about the tools for managing the energy and rhythm of one session of a Mentoring Circle, including

• In and out breaths;
• The Sonata Planner tool;
• Intuitive responsiveness (a.k.a., winging it, in a good way).

Teaching Video 4:
Guiding Principles and Desired Outcomes

What We Wish for our Mentees, What Truths or Principles Will Guide Us, and our Teaching Messages. You will learn why clear intentions are vital to your success. You will begin to develop your Desired Outcomes and Guiding Principles for your Circle (which will likely evolve over time).  You’ll learn how the Teaching Messages for each Circle are developed, drawing from the Map of Well-Being, your Desired Outcomes, and your Guiding Principles.

Teaching Video 5:
Parent Circles

Parents too are initiated through collaboration, skill-building, trying on new parenting approaches, and inner work. Parent Citcle may meet meet monthly, both before and subsequent to the launch of the Mentoring’ Circle. Parent Circles are designed to be replenishing and fun overall, but also challenging and transformative. The fact that parent are circling too has a *strong* positive impact on their children as individuals and as a circle.  We review the key elements of a basic Parent Circle and options for formats. We explore the choice of whether to include one or more mentors in some or all of your gatherings. We talk about shared leadership, collaborative decision-making, and paths for study and inner work.

Teaching Video 6:
Emotional and Social Well-Being   

Teaching emotional intelligence (EQ) through modeling, experience, dialogue, stories and skillful verbalization is a central vital facet of youth empowerment for both parents and mentors.  Key EQ skills include:

• Identifying, accepting, expressing and releasing one’s emotions
• Seeing your emotions as allies with an important message
• Empathizing and responding appropriately to the feeling of others.

You’ll learn more about these EQ skills as well as (a) ways to model EQ as a parent or mentor, (b) the importance of your inner work, and (c) core teaching messages for a Mentoring Circle and (d) examples of Circle activities for cultivating EQ.

Many of the skills needed skills to care for one’s Social Well-Being are one and the same with EQ skills.  You’ll learn which social skills and topics are generally most engaging for kids of different ages, and receive detailed instructions for leading some superbly fun and effective activities for your Mentoring Circles.

Teaching Video 7:
Body Sovereignty + Pleasure = Sexual Well-Being 

Overview: Body sovereignty; healthy boundaries; healthy relationships; the Super Protective Factor; positive body image; media literacy; pleasure as a guide rather than a taboo. We’ll cover these topics broadly, including examples of how to incorporate them into Mentoring Circles of different aged kids. Some of this material applies especially to parents, but it is important for non-parent mentors to understand, and a very powerful conversation for us as we connect with our own experiences as children and what messages about our changing bodies, our boundaries, and our pleasure that we received.

Teaching Video 8:
Understanding and Honoring Menstruation

Overview: Understanding how menstruation works; honoring menstruation; preparing a Moon Basket; celebrating menarche; Coming of Age as an adolescent Rite of Passage; charting and surfing one’s monthly hormonal cycles; alternative and conventional menstrual products; menstrual myths and taboos; cultural menstrual shame and embarrassment; positive menstrual traditions old and new.  An overview of these important topics with examples of how to incorporate them into Mentoring Circles of different ages. Note: Talking about menstruation is important for ALL genders!

Teaching Video 9:
Puberty and Sexuality

Overview of age-appropriate sex education ranging from self-pleasure, intercourse, alternatives to intercourse, birth control, STIs, the gender spectrum. We'll touch on the Super-Protective Factor, the Dutch Model, and the importance of open, down-to-earth, relaxed parent-child conversations about all things related to bodies, relationships, and sexuality.

Teaching Video 10:
Cultivating Intuition

Connecting with one’s intuition or inner knowing is an essential life skill that helps one make choices that are wise, safe, and life-serving.  And of course, it is also much more than that, but learning about it as a key component of one’s Inner Guidance System is a good introduction for kids, and it’s also an angle that draws in many parents.

You’ll learn learn a variety of engaging activities where you and your mentees may explore and practice the art of intuitive knowing. Kids really enjoy this, and there are so many cool, awakening, fun intuition-cultivating activities.

Teaching Video 11:
Ceremony, Coming of Age and Transformative Rites of Passage

In this session, we’ll look at the role of ritual and ceremony in how you gather in circle each time as well as how you may choose to celebrate or acknowledge completion points in your overall process.  You’ll learn the basic elements and how to adapt them according to the age of your mentees and your group’s preferred way to connect with the Divine, with the Earth, with the Universe, with Energy.

The circles I guide draw from a number of wisdom traditions including Buddhist, Taoist, pagan, Native American and shamanic, and yet are completely secular and appropriate for mentees of all open-minded religious/spiritual/philosophical backgrounds. I choose these elements according to my sense of the needs of youth, including to be fed and grounded by the boundless love of Mother Earth, to be bathed by the golden light of acceptance and blessing of Father Sky, and to sense the Beauty and Mystery that is within us and all around us.  We talk about what we’re going to do before we begin, and we adapt and experiment according to the wishes of the mentees.  

Your Circles, however, may be much less “spiritual” or may be centered on another belief system. So, you’ll learn how to adapt the key elements of circling to match your aims and the needs of your mentees.

Included is an overview of ceremonial elements that you may wish to incorporate into your process, such as Coming of Age Celebration, menarche ritual or a Red Party, and building a Willow Lodge.  And I’ll describe the difference between a developmental Coming of Age process and a transformative adolescent Rites of Passage process.

Teaching Video 12:
Charting Your Course

You will identify your core teaching messages, drawing from the Map of Well-being, your Guiding Principles, and your Desired Outcomes.  Then we will pencil them into your imagined calendar of Mentoring Circles and begin to fill in the stories and activities that will support what you will be teaching.  Exciting!

Teaching Video 13:
The Gift

Collecting all the elements and adding the finishing touches including engaging arts and crafts, magical ways to invite mentees to their first circle, and marketing.

To watch the Teaching Videos, join our amazing platform!

The JOYW Community hosts the entire Mentor Training - including the Teaching Videos and the Red Tent Video Library.

It's also where to engage in community conversation and to receive JOYW staff support - and where you'll receive invitations to our Zoom meetups (a.k.a., Virtual Red Tents). No more Facebook!

The new JOYW Community is beautiful and easy to navigate. You're going to love it!

🢂🢂🢂 For all current trainees and most former students, the new JOYW Community is FREE. 🢀🢀🢀

All current and former students have received emails with your free link to join. Write Katharine at [email protected] for another invitation to join for free.

Not a student of our Mentor Training yet?

We train people to lead Mentoring Circles where girls and non-binary kids learn to take charge of their physical, emotional, and social well-being. Instruction and support for boys' and all-genders mentorship is included. This is a self-paced, interactive, highly supported, online training.

• Substantial discount on the Certificate Mentor Training here. Earn a Certificate of Completion by taking notes and doing three assignments.
• Deep discount on the Essential Mentor Training here. Identical core content, but we don't review your notes and assignments.
• Mentoring Mini-Course on sale here. Earn a Certificate of Completion after just three Teaching Videos and one assignment.

Looking forward with pleasure to welcome you to our breath-taking community!