Launching Our Project

To launch our project, we each created a playlist, and then I combined each of these playlists into one large playlist. Each group member created or picked videos that related to the topic he or she researched and presented on.

We chose to create a playlist to connect with the larger audience on YouTube. We will reference (or have referenced) these videos while presenting our project to peers and professors for our case study. Follow the link to YouTube in the video box to watch the rest of the playlist.

YouTube Playlist is Coming Soon

Now that we are back from Thanksgiving, it is time to kick it into gear and finish up our project. We are delegating out responsibilities and finishing up the semester!

We gathered our extra research information and sent the links to Audrey to create an email to send up as our follow up material to our parents and family members who participated in the webinar. After we send this email out, we will send out a link to our playlist in another email. The Youtube playlist was supposed to be finished this morning before class, but a few of the group members were having technical difficulties, so I will post about the playlist later tonight, when I finish collecting those videos.

Here is Audrey's email that we all contributed links to:


We would like to thank you for joining us in our first ever webinar! The Digital Sweet Home Project has been a wonderful opportunity for us to learn more about how digital media can truly have an impact on strengthening our families. We promised you that we would give you resources that related to each of our presentations. We have organized it into four categories for you: Internet Safety, Media How-To Guides, LDS Links, and Parent & Youth Relationships. There are several resources available to you. We hope that these give you a starting place!
Thanks,
Audrey Blake, Jake Cannon, Allie Crafton, Rebecca Graham, and Cami Wilson
Internet Safety

1. The Internet Safety Project (The largest Wiki on the World Wide Web with articles, podcasts, and newswires all related to Internest Safety. Highly Recommended.)

1. Mary Kay Hoal: Helping Families Have a Positive and Safe Experience Online

1. K9 Web Protection

1. What Parents Need to Know: How Students Use Technology to Cheat

1. Digital Dilemma of Raising Digital Kids: Using Technology to Torment Your Kids 

1. Talking to Kids about Online Porn: How One Dad Handled it

1. Three Ways to Keep Tabs on Your Kids Online

Media How-To Guides

1. LDS Church Resources on How to Use Media

1. Facebook

1. Pinterest

1. Twitter

1. Google Plus

1. Just Family (And here is the link to the video.)

LDS Links

1. Finding Joy in the Journey by President Thomas S. Monson

1. Sharing the Gospel Using the Internet by Elder Russell M. Ballard

1. A Matter of a Few Degrees by President Dieter F. Uchtdorf

1. Three Goals to Guide You by President Thomas S. Monson

1. Things as They Really Are by Elder David A. Bednar (Audio version here)

1. Choose the Right Media (Friend)

1. Screening Your Screen Time (New Era)

1. Keeping Safe and Balanced in a Google-YouTube-Twitter-Facebook-iEverything World (Ensign)

1. LDS Media Library Aims to Help Members Learn, Share, and Create

Parent & Youth Relationships

1. Parenting Tip: Recommended Screen Time for Children (Good Housekeeping)

1. A Platform for Good (FANTASTIC! "A project of the Family Online Safety Institute designed to help parents, teachers and teens to connect, share and do good online.")

1. The Fine Line Between Monitoring Your Kids and Spying

1. Yoursphere for Parents (This also relates to Internet Safety)

1. Yoursphere for Youth (A safe place on the web for kids to be social!)

1. Ten Life-Changing Benefits of the Internet Age

1. Family Search: Digital Storytelling (This is a hybrid way to collect and store your family history all in one place!!)

1. Mommy Blogger Benefits (BYU Magazine)

1. Tech Obsessed Kids and What to Do with Them

1. Can You Be a Good Parent Without Tech?

1. Benefits of Online Social Networking

1. E-Parenting: Media Wise Parenting in a Digital World

1. Generation Gap Extends to Perceptions about Teens' Online Behavior

Slides for Presentation

So after the feedback from the class I've decided to keep my presentation very short. I have minimized the information I will share. Dr. Burton recommended that we share very brief ideas and various movies to inspire further discussion. The topics will come up naturally through discussion, so we do not need to worry about bringing up every subject before the actual discussion. We should make this fireside more discussion based instead of turning it into a lecture. Here is how my presentation will go:

After Allie has presented on digital literacy, I will acknowledge that this information might all be very overwhelming or frustrating. Using this slide I will lead into a quick brief discussion about how nothing is constant as change.

In my childhood my parents refused to succumb to the overuse of TV and video games in our home. We didn't have a TV big enough to watch anything on it until I was eight. Our television had about a 12 inch screen. But, my dad has worked with computers all of his life. Before we upgraded our TV we had five computers in my house. And we quickly integrated the internet use into our home. I can't believe how much technology has changed since then. It can be overwhelming and stressful. But with the proper use, digital media can be used to bless our lives and the lives of our family members.

I will read this quote from President Monson's talk Finding Joy in the Journey from the October 2008 conference. This next slide will link to a video about the sisters four. I will connect this to the quote above by explaining that we can find joy in the journey with our families through digital media. Even though the constant change of our digital world can be overwhelming we don't need to stress about it. We don't have to use every new piece of technology. And we have to realize that every family is different. My parents chose to not use video game and television in our home, while we used a lot of computers and internet. We just recently updated to smart phones, but we got along just fine without them. Figure out what works best for your family.

This presentation will obviously have to change if we end up creating a YouTube playlist instead of a fireside.

To inspire discussion and further questions about my subject, we can ask:

-How does your family use digital media to connect?

-What concerns do you have about the rapid change of technology?

-How do you deal with the rapid change of technology?

-What are some ways that current technology has helped you find joy?

Friday at the MMSS

We probably talked about a few of these ideas in class already, but the Mormon Media Studies Symposium presentations that I was able to attend brought up a lot of interesting subjects about Media and Digital Culture. 

A few thoughts I gathered from "Mormonism & Media Literacy: Intersection of Media and Education in LDS Theology and Culture" Panel:

Every time we are introduced to new media we still hold on to our old media. Making us double- and triple-booked. How are we supposed to properly manage our time when we double-book ourselves. This leads to the frustration of trying to do too many things at once.

I can definitely relate to this. Sometimes at work I feel like I am trying to do ten different things at once. I'm trying to post about the Museum of Art on the blog, on Facebook, and on Twitter, I'm trying to post about all of the departments in the College of Fine Arts and Communications on the blog, on the Facebook page, and on the Twitter account, I'm trying to write articles on news, I'm trying to keep in touch with Museum officials about correct credit lines and event information, I'm texting my boss or my boyfriend, I'm talking with the people in my office, I'm trying to update the running awards list I have going, and I'm trying to edit articles and pictures that come through my email. And this is just at work...at home I'm trying to do all of my computer stuff on top of exercising, making meals, eating, sleeping, and receiving phone calls. This isn't all media stuff. But it's definitely following the same pattern of adding one thing on top of another.

The electronic age led to a social disconnect and individualism, whereas the digital age leads to connectivity and collaboration through the internet. The internet is our global village, our collective identity.

I thought this was brilliant! I know we've been talking about this in class, but I love how they broke this down into stages of the digital age. Whereas TV and other electronic devices on their own led to separation, the use of the internet has led to a new connectedness. We don't have to waste time in front of the TV. We can connect about what is on the TV through the internet. We can build positive relationships and create content on the internet. 

Another good point that was made, was that although we have all of this information, just at our fingertips, we cannot assume that this access to information means access to truth. We still need to use the Holy Ghost to determine truths.

Very sound advice. We cannot assume that everything we read on the internet is true. What a wonderful symposium. I was glad that I could listen to so many presentations and learn about how the Church is involved in the current media.

Mormon Media Studies Symposium

Today for work I sat through three hours of presentations at the Mormon Media Studies Symposium. I had a blast video taping, taking notes, tweeting, and making a few Facebook posts. I would like to encourage the class to participate. Here are a few screen shots from twitter and Facebook:

It was fascinating to sit through these presentations to learn about what LDS members are doing today to share the gospel through media. I learned about Mormons in Jerusalem, LDS public affairs in Europe, Visual Framing of the election on religious websites, the LDS bloggernacle, and specific research about LDS public affairs and media in Italy. These are all things that will be beneficial to our presentation in encoraging LDS parents to use digital media as a positive interactive tool in their lives. I will try to make another post about what I learned later. For now, I have to write a paper for another class.

Webinar Presentation

So tonight was our presentation in a webinar. I think it was very helpful and we finally figured out the organization of our presenation. Unfortunately a lot of my material is going to be different in our actual presentation since we changed around the organization of our outline. But, I will be fixing this all tomorrow morning before class.

This is the outline of my presentation. It is not very concise, but I need to work on releasing early and releasing more often...so here is more of my brainstorming. My slides in the presentation hopefully made this information more clear, but still I needed to cut out a lot.

Change:

-Nothing is as constant as change.

-In this class we began to discuss how change is inevitable in the digital age that we live in.

-Especially now in our fast paced digital age, change comes so quickly. New trends, inventions, businesses, digital tools come and go faster than ever before. It is hard to get used to these changes as they come more quickly each year.

Day by day, minute by minute, second by second we went from where we were to where we are now. The lives of all of us, of course, go through similar alterations and changes. The difference between the changes in my life and the changes in yours is only in the details. Time never stands still; it must steadily march on, and with the marching come the changes.
This is our one and only chance at mortal life—here and now. The longer we live, the greater is our realization that it is brief. Opportunities come, and then they are gone. I believe that among the greatest lessons we are to learn in this short sojourn upon the earth are lessons that help us distinguish between what is important and what is not. I plead with you not to let those most important things pass you by as you plan for that illusive and nonexistent future when you will have time to do all that you want to do. Instead, find joy in the journey—now. 

I began getting interested in this idea of change and opportunity when I came across this quote in a book I was reading for another class:

As David Eggers says we

have an opportunity to do everything better —to carry on those traditions that made sense and to jettison those that didn't —which is something every parent has the chance to do, of course, to show up one's own parents, do everything better, to upwardly evolve from them...

This got me thinking about the digital culture and how digital media has changed our culture drastically from the generations before us. The way we parent now is drastically different than the way they parented only ten to twenty years ago. Concerns about the digital age and the rapidity of digital culture are scary, new, and provide unlimited opportunity. Some rules from before still apply, and should be applied, while new rules and new opportunities should also be integrated.

Now it may seem crazy to have a bunch of college kids come and talk to you about the greatness of using digital media to help with family connectivity and parenting. But we are trying to bridge the gap in generations and teach how to use digital media to help families.

With Web 2.0 the internet is an interactive space. A place of opportunity. We want you to realize that there is more to digital media than just the negative act of consumption. In our class this semester we have discussed the c’s of digital culture.

They are:

To Create
To Consume
And To Connect

This is a summary of a lot of my past blog posts. I now will incorporate this text (while making it more concise) into a presentation of how different families deal with change. Each family is different and I will share more personal anecdotes about a variety of different families and how they use digital media to connect.

Finding Joy on the Web

In preparing for our group's upcoming webinars I have decided to start brainstorming over what I will share in our presentation. Due to midterms I have been neglecting my blog and I hope that this post will be the beginning of a long line of blogs on this topic. Our group plans to have all our material ready and then have a practice webinar with each other, present to a family or two and then eventually give a fireside to a family ward. We outlined our topics in our last iteration:

CONNECTION: Audrey

Forming the connection and how to use media to spread good rather than evil. This includes sharing things with friends and family.
-Share examples from a teen perspective and from a big sister perspective.
-Building the establishment of trust and openness
-Presenting challenges to give to their teens

CHANGE: Cami

Dealing with change and the rush of digital culture.
-Closing the technological gap between generations
-Set regulations and still be open to change
-Ensign article Keeping Safe and Balanced in a Google-YouTube-Twitter- Facebook- iEverything World

BALANCE: Jake

-Discuss his “conversion”
-Also cover how to decide consumption of digital media using expert advice, personal experience,
and Church resources. (Not just making that decision based on fear or one facet.)
-Examples of balance/ importance of “unplugging” sometimes
-President Eyring’s talk

DIGITAL LITERACY: Allie

-The “how-to” of resources for the family, including LDS apps

YOUR FAMILY: Rebecca

-What does all of this mean for your family? Every family is different
-Snapshots/examples of how different families have found connection, growth in change, balance, and digital literacy in different ways
-Cater this information to your family through prayer, family counsel, FHE, etc.

As I was going over these ideas this morning I had the thought that maybe we should switch up the order of our presentations. Not that I really want to go first, and I know that as we build our material we will easily be able to transition and fit everything in together to make sense. But I thought that maybe we should have a few opening lines about why we chose to focus on the family and connectivity and then go into the more broad idea of the change, development and positivity of digital culture (stating that the digital age calls for more than just consumption, but also creating and connecting). Then focus on the power of connectivity through the digital age, give warnings about keeping a balance, then the how to, and then applying it to individual families. But this is all just a thought, let me know what you think.

Just a few more brief ideas on what I will focus in in my section:

-Change is inevitable. Our digital age changes more quickly than anything has in the past.
-Quote from Finding Joy In the Journey by President Monson:

I begin by mentioning one of the most inevitable aspects of our lives here upon the earth, and that is change. At one time or another we’ve all heard some form of the familiar adage: “Nothing is as constant as change.”
Throughout our lives, we must deal with change. Some changes are welcome; some are not. There are changes in our lives which are sudden, such as the unexpected passing of a loved one, an unforeseen illness, the loss of a possession we treasure. But most of the changes take place subtly and slowly.

-Another quote (from the same talk):

Day by day, minute by minute, second by second we went from where we were to where we are now. The lives of all of us, of course, go through similar alterations and changes. The difference between the changes in my life and the changes in yours is only in the details. Time never stands still; it must steadily march on, and with the marching come the changes.
This is our one and only chance at mortal life—here and now. The longer we live, the greater is our realization that it is brief. Opportunities come, and then they are gone. I believe that among the greatest lessons we are to learn in this short sojourn upon the earth are lessons that help us distinguish between what is important and what is not. I plead with you not to let those most important things pass you by as you plan for that illusive and nonexistent future when you will have time to do all that you want to do. Instead, find joy in the journey—now.

-Apply this to the use of the internet—the internet makes our lives change more quickly, it can be stressful and we can easily get caught up in the negativity associated with the internet and digital culture—but we must remember that the internet can also be used for good.
-Mention Web 2.0?
-Digital culture doesn't have to be just a time-waster—provides a positive space to consume, create, and connect. The internet is not only a place for consumption. You can use it for many great things. We would like to help you embrace the change and embrace your families through digital culture. Change brings opportunity.