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.
Our group of students just got back from a trip to Creel, MEXICO. As one would expect after a momentous trip, these students are ready to take on the world. They saw a different part of the world that most of them had never experienced, served those that were in need in big ways, and jumped out of their comfort zones with leaps and bounds.
I want to harness this energy and keep the momentum going by challenging them with stories of others who are using their gifts creatively to change their world. Here are four that I’m going to be highlighting in the next few weeks with my students… maybe you could, too.
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This first one hits close to home (for our students) and yet has a potentially very far reaching arm. Jason Salamun is a friend to our student ministry and a local church planter here in Rapid City, SD. He’s shared with our students before at our Wednesday night rally services, so most of our students would recognize the name or, at the least, his face.
Jason is doing something simple, yet profound. He’s challenging himself to lose weight and, in the process, he’s challenging his online community, friends, and family to donate a dollar per pound that he loses in the next three months to one of six great causes listed on his site. I think it’s an awesome idea; check it out at ThisMustChange.org.
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The Laundry Love Project (LLP) grabbed me from the first time I watched the following video. LLPs are regular opportunities to help people who are struggling financially by assisting them with doing their laundry. Relationships are built, and LLPs become small communities of common concern in which participants often find that they receive assistance and benefit with other areas of their lives. LLPs are just one of several initiatives of the JustOne nonprofit organization.
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The Freeze Project is another simple idea to challenge our communities with social injustice issues. The idea is to have a group of people gather at an area and do a pre-determined group “freeze” in a very public, high traffic place — an action made popular by Improv Everywhere — and putting a twist on it to bring awareness to social injustice issues. Nice!
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Here’s another one that seems particularly relevant to my group of students right now. We just got back from distributing shoes (and food, clothes, etc.) to the Tarahumaran Natives in the mountains of Copper Canyon. The idea behind TOMS Shoes was founded on one premise: “With every pair you purchase, TOMS will give a pair of new shoes to a child in need. One for One.” What a profound way of doing business.
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Take these ideas and challenge your students with them. Maybe do one of them as a group, making it your own. Or just challenge students with these stories so that they can be encouraged to change the world with their own God-given ideas and gifts. Imagine what change could be affected through the Gen Y generation!
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!
I can remember having to put together a whole rite of passage project for students “coming of age” when I was in the School of Youth Ministry at Christ for the Nations Institute in Texas. It was my last year as a student at CFNI and this was the big project for a class called “Adolescent Development”. We studied adolescent development (big surprise), how junior highers process things differently on a mental level, social groupings, and different ways that the church can celebrate their transformation from “tween-ager” to teenager. It all seemed so simple and easy to me then. I even got an “A+” on the big project.
Fast forward ten years… I’ve been in full time youth ministry since graduating and now have two teenage daughters of my own. I feel like I am more perplexed about how to walk through this thing called adolescence than I was ten years ago — especially as a parent! Woo-boy! It’s easier to disseminate head knowledge to someone’s kid and share with them “how it is/should be” and how “scientifically, it’s been said…” It’s an entirely different thing to go through the process and experience adolescence with your own kids.
I’ve thought to myself several times… “oh, so this is what Mom and Dad felt like when I was [doing that crazy stuff when I was in junior high].”
The emotional extremes and craziness that I’ve always known to exist — because I lived it out myself (and laugh about it now) — is being played out every day in front of me. It’s just weird watching it from the other side, as a pastor and a parent. It’s such an important time in the formation of spiritual and moral disciplines. What can we do to help our young ones step into this next phase of life?
I’ve seen full blown bar mitzvah-type ceremonies with parents and loved ones offering their prayers and words of advice.
I’ve seen programs where leaders walk students through physical, mental, and spiritual challenges.
I’ve seen camping trips with the guys and sleep-overs with the girls along with cake and candles.
I’m not sure what works best, but I am certain that any chance to celebrate students’ growth and relationship with Jesus is worth it. And I definitely believe this is a tradition that we should encourage parents and youth workers alike to carry on.
Check out this short clip taken from my family’s recent celebration of my daughter, Cynthia, turning 13. It was during a time that we had several adults saying prayers of blessing / protection over her and giving our “words of wisdom”. Autumn, Cynthia’s older sister by one year, had been downstairs watching the little ones and we had just brought her up to pray over her sister. This was her prayer…
I won’t soon forget this moment. It’s my prayer that Cynthia won’t either.
Looking for a fresh and new way to get the wisdom of Proverbs into the hearts and minds of your students? Try the wisdom deck. Here’s Mark Matlock of Planet Wisdom to introduce you to this simple and practical tool…
Last week at our district youth leaders retreat we were reminded how vital it is to make contact with students transitioning from high school to college within the first two weeks of their first semester. It’s an easy way to remind them that they are not alone during what can be a difficult time.
I know how true this is as I remembered a letter that I received from my youth pastor in the fall of 1996 as a freshmen at Trinity Bible College. That note of encouragement reminded me that one of my heroes knew where I was and was cheering me on. It could not have come at a better time for me. I still have that note…
If you’ve never been introduced to the Skit Guys, please allow me the pleasure. We get to see them about once a year at youth worker training events and they always crack us up! A guy behind me was laughing so hard when we saw them this year, that he spit out his soda — fun times! The great thing is that the Skit Guys are also really great at applying truth in hard hitting ways. Check them out at skitguys.com.
The following video was filmed at the 2005 National Youth Workers Convention and features a senior pastor introducing a new youth pastor to the students for the first time…
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).
I was watching Youth Specialties’ podcast this morning, which featured live footage from last weekend’s National Youth Workers Convention (NYWC) in Pittsburg. It moved me… I’ve attended several of these in the years past but wasn’t able to go the last couple of years as I was saving up for a trip to Israel (which was also a life-changing experience). But… I’ve really missed NYWC and can’t wait to get back this year at the event in Nashville. Here’s the YS Podcast for those of you who are interested…
Watching this took me back to the last NYWC Deanna, Amy, and I attended back in 2005. The location was Sacramento, CA and we had little-Mikella (less then a year old) with us for the trip. So fun! So many great memories…
Did I say that I can’t wait for Nashville?! This year I have the added joy of being one of the event’s live-bloggers. You’ll be able to join Deanna and I in real time at http://nywc.com/live (will go live during the convention). Again – so fun!
If you are a youth worker and looking for a great convention to go to, I can’t recommend NYWC enough. Every year that I attend I come back feeling so equipped and highly encouraged! That should speak of the convention all for itself, but above and beyond that there are so many other added bonuses: great live music, moving drama, incredible worship, great connections, lots of laughs, and so much more. To be honest, you just have to experience it to get the full effect. There’s just so much! Sign up now for 2009: http://nywc.com.
Join us @ 11:30 am on every first Thursday of the month at the Alternative Fuel Coffee House on 620 Main Street in Rapid City. Come early and grab your meal; we’d love to meet you there!
The first half hour of our gatherings are focused on youth worker fellowship and prayer and, starting at around 12-noon, we shift to a training / discussion time. All are welcome.
I can remember having to put together a whole rite of passage project for students “coming of age” when I was in the 
