Hi Rick,
It sounds as if you have considerable knowledge of your own to
share; one of the good things about working at GIA is the
sheer amount of info that gets bandied about everyday and I’ll
take any info I can get. . . even at this late date. In regard to
mentoring, the only advice I have is that at the beginning,
humor and excitment might be more important than technique. It
seems to me if someone is excited about what he’s doing., he’ll
be motivated to improve his technique. I might suggest a wax
project to begin with. My 12 year old nephew and I carved a
dolphin pendant and cast it for his dads birthday. It was pretty
easy and kept him interested. We had to finish the casting and I
demo’d a litte soldering with the jump-ring etc. So there was an
intro to fabrication. Also, in wax its easy to correct your
mistakes. Hope that helps some.
Steve