Perhaps the best way of learning is by doing. Here are a few ways you can create those learning opportunities:

• Offer opportunities to participate in the work of the philanthropy. Young people can join senior family members on site visits, draft family histories, read proposals, create websites, and more. Encourage young people to participate in ways that excite them.
• Create a dinner-table foundation. Set aside some funds at a family gathering and offer young people the opportunity to distribute those funds to charity as a group. If successful, you can make it a regular activity.
• Create a next-generation board or committee. A sort of foundation-within-a-foundation, next-generation boards introduce family members to the kind of grantmaking they may do later as trustees.
• Encourage personal giving with discretionary and matching grants. Matching grants can be especially effective as they encourage the commitment of personal resources.
• Remember that you’re not just teaching grantmaking. Let young people in on other aspects of philanthropic and foundation work by holding meetings to discuss your charitable investments and adopting professional practices at all next-generation meetings.
• Encourage young people to attend peer learning opportunities at conferences and workshops.
• Explore grantmaking with other organizations. Community foundations, universities, schools, and other groups often have youth grantmaking committees. Encourage young people to join them, or create a new one. Family philanthropy is certainly a family affair, but don’t miss the opportunity to spark the philanthropic spirit in others.