Archive for Technology

Twitter As a Youth Ministry Tool

August 21, 2009 · Filed under Pop Culture, Resources / Tools, Technology, Training, Web Sites, YM Ideas · Tagged , , , , ,

tweet

I first heard about Twitter two years ago when I was researching for a parent Internet workshop I was preparing to teach. When I found out that the purpose of Twitter was to supposedly answer the question, “What are you doing now?”, I actually laughed about it. I made fun of it in front of my class! But then I signed up for an account and tried it out. The rest — as they say — is history.

You can now follow me at http://twitter.com/shawnmichael. As you can see, I’m pretty much fully immersed in the “NOW” culture that is Twitter.

If you need a little help with how Twitter functions, take a second and watch this…

HOW HAS TWITTER BEEN A RESOURCE AND A TOOL FOR ME IN YOUTH MINISTRY?

* It has helped me network with youth workers locally. I can keep in touch with what local youth workers are doing outside of our monthly network meetings. Depending on what they are tweeting, I can find out what they are teaching, what they are struggling with, how I can pray for them, and — yes — what they are eating for lunch and other trivial things that people tweet about. But I see value in ALL of it. I like getting to know people outside of their youth-ministry-world, too.

* I can also follow leaders in the field of youth ministry. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gleaned some of my best ministry ideas in the past couple of years from my Twitter stream. In addition, I’ve even been able to send short comments to them and, in some cases, hear back! What fun!

* Lots of great student ministry sites utilize Twitter. Be the first to hear about new content, prizes, and youth ministry ideas that they have to offer.

* Keep parents/guardians informed and updated on student trips. Parents can now get updates from camp, youth convention, weekend retreats, etc. in real time and it is as easy as sending a text from your phone.

* Students ministry pics and video are also easy to publish… through services like TwitPic and 12Seconds.tv or even simply posting links to Flickr, YouTube, or any other media site.

* Stay current on just about any topic. Twitter is a great way to keep up-to-date on youth culture, local news, youth training events, etc.

* Get quick answers to general questions. Sometimes if you post a question, you’ll get answers within minutes. For example:“Does anyone have a good resource for teen counseling in the event of a family loss?” “Looking for an extra pop-up tent that I can borrow for camp next month. Any ideas?” “Is there a good online resource for junior high small group curriculum?”

* Get travel help when trouble arises. True life example… I texted the following: “The interstate is shut down due to snow. Anyone want some surprise overnight visitors on the eastern side of South Dakota?” I had about six invites to stay overnight within a couple of hours. Not bad at all!

* It’s a tremendous way to share prayer needs. Think about it: your requests immediately go out to all your followers and they are praying within minutes. How cool is that?!

I could keep going… Twitter has opened up a whole new world of resources for me. I hope I’ve encouraged some of you to, at the least, give it a try. If so, let me know! I’d be glad to help you get started.

Leave a comment »

Text-to-Movie?

May 17, 2009 · Filed under Pop Culture, Resources / Tools, Technology, Web Sites, YM Ideas · Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

Xtranormal

I’ve been seeing videos from a service called Xtranormal pop up here and there and wanted to check it out. This could have some cool youth ministry applications.

Here’s what they say about the service on their site:

Xtranormal’s mission is to bring movie-making to the people. Everyone watches movies and we believe everyone can make movies. Movie-making, short and long, online and on-screen, private and public, will be the most important communications process of the 21st century.

Our revolutionary approach to movie-making builds on an almost universally held skill—typing. You type something; we turn it into a movie. On the web and on the desktop.

Is what they say as easy as it sounds? Well, you’ll see rather quickly that I’m no J. J. Abrams, but I was able to quickly — in about ten minutes — throw together this little video for your viewing pleasure. All it takes is typing in a script, dragging and dropping in some physical reactions, picking the background scene and music, and clicking publish…

Kind of fun, huh? Youth group announcements, anyone? Give it a try!

Leave a comment »

Launch of MinistryQuestions.com

February 10, 2009 · Filed under Resources / Tools, Technology, Web Sites · Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

ministryquestions_post

I’m so excited to announce the launch of my friend, Tim Schmoyer’s, new ministry resouce site: MinistryQuestions.com.  Tim is the youth leader behind LifeinStudentMinistry.com and the OnlineMissionsTrip.com.  The site officially launched this evening and will feature the ability for youth workers to ask and answer questions (via text, audio, or video), interact in the advice/debate section, and get plugged into ministry mentoring relationships.  What a resource!  Here’s a quick overview video from Tim himself…

Stay updated by going to the site and subscribing to the RSS feeds or by following @MinistryQandA on Twitter.

Leave a comment »

10 Reasons Why Youth Workers and Flip Mino Should Be Friends

December 11, 2008 · Filed under Resources / Tools, Technology, YM Ideas · Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

flipminohd

Now, I know… some of you are thinking, “Just what youth workers need… another electronic distraction!”  No, really!  The Flip Mino is something you should check into for your ministry.  Here’s five reaons I came up with after unboxing — and, yes, playing with — my new Mino HD just this morning:

* PRICE – Every youth workere that I know is watching their budget.  The good news is that the very highest end Mino model, the one that shoots in HD (which I highly recommend), is less than $250. The Ultra model is under $130!

* SIZE – These things are so small that you can literally put it into your coat pocket and grab great video moments whenever and wherever they arrive.  I plan on keeping mine with me as much as possible.  That way, when the students start an impromptu Thanksgiving service pumpkin pie fight, you’ve got all the footage to prove who started it at the elder’s meeting later.  Tee-hee!

* EASE OF USE – There’s not much to figure out here.  Just a power button, record button, zoom functions, and delete.  Simplicity is beauty.  There’s not even a memory card to lose!  When you want to load your video to your laptop, just “flip” the USB connector out and the built in Flip software helps do the rest — no cables required!  My first video was online and ready-to-share with the world 5 minutes after I unboxed the Mino — no joke! (and the majority of that time was taken up by the hosting site processing the video)

* VIDEO QUALITY – One of the selling points for me was the high video quality that I’ve been seeing by other Mino users — especially the Mino HD.  The quality on the HD version rivals some much more expensive video cameras that I’ve used in the past.

* VIDEO IS THE NEW MULTIMEDIA MEDIUM – ‘Nough said.

Here are five practical ways that you can use the Flip Mino in your ministry:

* Film your highlight moments from youth services: gross games, student testimonies, student worship, mis-behaving students (grin), etc.

* Take it out to film a video-journal of your thoughts during a youth event (like I did here with my HD cam this summer) or even start a regular video-blog feature (such as this).

* Film on-the-spot student confessionals / testimonials a la reality shows (great for the end of camp week).

* Take it with you to a b-ball game and film that end-of-the season, game-winning shot that features a student from your ministry.

* Capture video all year long and create a highlights video at the end of the year (here’s our 2006-2007 video)

Anyhow, there’s a few ideas… and I’m sure that you can come up with many more.

Leave a comment »

10 Free Website Creation Tools

December 8, 2008 · Filed under Resources / Tools, Technology, Web Sites · Tagged , , , , , , , ,

webs_home

Youth workers are always looking for free + cool tools for ministry. Several technology-challenged youth workers are also wondering how to get their ministry/group on the Web.  Church Crunch has a great post that lists 10 places for you to check out to do just that.  Read it here.

Leave a comment »

Using Your Cell Phone in Worship

November 27, 2008 · Filed under Spiritual, Technology · Tagged , , , , ,

top-5-cell-phones

At the youth workers convention I was at last week, there were several cool uses of the cell phone for worship/prayer. My favorite one was through a prayer exercise led by Jeanne Stevens.  She started by saying something like, “Maybe you feel like you need to be filled up this week” and then asked those that agreed with the statement to turn their phone display on. Within the darkness we saw that there were others with the same struggles, while it still gave some sense of ambiguity. The lights filling up the auditorium was quite the site to see — overwhelming me emotionally at times.  It was a very unique experience.

For more ways we used the cell phone during the NYWC, visit this post at Fork in the Road Music.

Comments (1) »

Online Youth Ministry 101: Lifeway

October 16, 2008 · Filed under Resources / Tools, Technology, Training, Web Sites, YM Ideas · Tagged , , , , , , , , ,

Lifeway just posted a good entry-level article for youth workers wanting to ease their way into student Internet ministry.  They list four free tools/site recommendations for connecting with students online.  Definitely worth the quick read.

ht Lifeway

Leave a comment »

RSS is Easy

October 6, 2008 · Filed under Resources / Tools, Technology, Web Sites · Tagged , , , , , ,

RSS is where it’s at when it comes to web content… seriously.  If you haven’t jumped on the bandwagon yet, you might get left behind!  It’s the easiest (and funnest) way to stay up-to-date with all your frequently visited web sites.  I just recently switched to Google Reader for my web feeds and it couldn’t be any simpler.  Here’s a quick video to show you how easy it is to be a person that’s “in the know” when it comes to your favorite web content…

Leave a comment »

12 Seconds

September 22, 2008 · Filed under Resources / Tools, Technology, Web Sites, YM Ideas · Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

What can you say in 12 seconds?  Not much, but this new short-video service might be a fun new way to incorporate video into your Twitter accounts or student e-blasts.  Check out 12seconds.tv and try out these “10 Ways to Use 12seconds.tv in Youth Ministry” from Youth Ministry Geek:

1. Quick announcements

2. Daily/weekly devo

3. Goofy videos of the students

4. Student of the week - maybe they can give their acceptance speech (make sure to spread the love and get everyone on video)

5. Ask the youth worker – answer the students questions on a regular basis

6. Ask the student - you ask a question you want answered

7. Event/Class Teaser - Promote an upcoming event with a short teaser about what they can expect (maybe even “cut yourself off” at the end right when you were going to reveal the big secret)

8. Meet the youth coaches - have the youth coaches (other adults who help) share a little about themselves

9. Recap of last lesson/message - you would be forced to really narrow down your focus, because you only have 12 seconds

10. Tip of the week - it could be a parent tip, youth worker tip, teenager tip or a tip for any other group you can think of (ie. 1 tip on how to contact a student during the week – for the youth coaches)

12Seconds also has a lot of fun community “challenges” such as this one: “Sing Your Favorite Song When You Were 13.”  Here was my personal response…

Check out my other posts at my 12seconds channel.  The service is still in private beta, so if you need an invite, I still have a few left — just ask.

Comments (3) »

Youth Ministry Video Goofs

September 22, 2008 · Filed under Technology · Tagged , , , , , , , , , ,

Have you ever failed to fully preview a media clip and end up embarrassed because of it?  Check out Josh Giffen’s story, high school student pastor at Saddleback, and see if you can match what he call the “worst youth ministry video goof in history”.

Leave a comment »

« Previous entries
Next Page »