Disconnected Adolescents in a Connected World

I have been working with an adolescent student who is experiencing some depression. We have been exploring a couple of strategies to improve her emotional wellbeing, including writing, engaging in at least one activity outside of school and expanding her social network. And this is where we met with some elements that require problem solving. The student lives on a property outside of town and the people who live one the nearby properties do not have children or their children are in their twenties. Another issue for her is that her friends all use Telstra for their mobile service and she uses Voda Phone. In her own words: “I’m too expensive”, her friends won’t message her because it costs too much and they don’t get free text messages to her.

So I suggested to this student that she look at some social networking sites. She tells me she had set up a Myspace account but rarely uses it and finds it difficult to access the internet for two reasons: one her family has a dial up connection which drops out regularly and two her mother doesn’t like her spending time on the internet so limits her time to school work only. We discussed her combining her journal writing with a blog and connecting with people on line. But she was pessimistic about these possibilities because her mother believes that the internet is a time waster. (I think part of this might be her mother trying to protect her and monitor/manage her activity on the internet. And it is important to keep tabs on adolescents internet activities. However I think there is also potential for social and emotional benefits for this student given her circumstances).

One of the issues contributing to this student’s feelings of depression is that she is not connected in a connected world. She isn’t in the text message loop her friends are in and she has limited access to IM because of the dial up connection and having her time on the computer restricted. Consequently she misses out on a whole world of communication that occurs between leaving school one day and starting class the next morning.

I believe for this child, who is geographically isolated, the internet could connect her to a network of support that she currently doesn’t have. I have asked the student to talk to her mum about her feelings of depression and disconnection from her peers and discuss the possibilities of using the internet to develop connections with her peers outside of school, as well as school work. I would also like to publish something in the newsletter about social networking sites and their benefits for adolescents in developing connections. I would like to put something in the newsletter which she can encourage her mother to read that discusses appropriate use of scoial networking sites to improve the social and emotional wellbeing of isolated students, which can also provide pratical information for keeping her daughter safe on the interent as well as supporting her daughter to create connections (which will hopefully alleviate any concerns and provide practical strategies fore her mother to employ in monitoring her internet use). If anybody out there in the bloggersphere has any useful information, links, articles, ideas for information to incorporate in a newsletter for parents I would greatly appreciate some help and direction in gathering some information together.

Acknowledging Professional Networks

I've been surfing blogs lately, following one link to another, when I stumbled across a post entitled The Blame Game on The Strength of Weak Ties by David. After reading this I began to think about my Learning Support Group (the staff in my Performance Management group) and the T & D record sheets I have been signing off in lieu of week 41 (which staff will not have to work if they have accumulated at least 38 hours of T&D hours throughout the year). And it occurred to me that of all the professional development and training I have signed off none of it was online training or development in Web 2.0 tools. Many staff claimed "professional reading" as part of their hours and I question how much of that was online reading.

I, myself, did claim hours for online training this year. I didn't, however, claim any professional reading, one because I didn't need to and two because it didn't occur to me that I could claim my blog or the reading associated with my professional network online. II know the hours I have spent developing my blog, reading other people's blogs and the many RSS feeds through my bloglines accounts along with creating a professional network online are well in excess of 38 hours.

As a site in a regional area it is logical for staff to develop professional networks online. There is no need for them to be isolated in their practice simply because of their geographical location. I would like see our site promote blogs and social networks as a legitimate training and development activity, and will do this with my Learning Support Group next year. I wonder what would happen if we were to encourage that a percentage of T & D hours claimed for professional reading involve reading blogs or online content?