I’ve asked before and I’ll ask again…

Why do you come here?  What brings you to my blog and when you get here what do you like about it?  What kinds of things do you find helpful?  Is anything missing?

You may notice if you venture beyond the front page of this site that the resources page has altered a little to include an Amazon Store.

I link most of the books and resources I talk about to Amazon so it seemed to make sense to collect them in one place so you can click through to them and see what else I’ve been reading, watching, playing with and listening to.

The sidebar now also contains an Amazon widget with my top 6 recommendations.

[disclosure: If you click through and buy anything I get 5% in Amazon vouchers. Not that that's why I've added the feature. Honest.]

I’ve also worked out how to change the header picture so look out for some new ones over the coming months.

DK at Media Snackers has been on a bit of a campaign to get Youth Workers in the statutory sector to blog.  It would seem that there are very few who do (he’s found one!), which perhaps is a consequence of Local Authorities attitudes to their staff having any kind of online profile (it’s BAD).

The same is true of the church.  Rumour has it that the powers that be added Facebook to the list of blocked websites in the Church of Scotland’s offices the day before Gordon Brown (yes the Prime Minister) gave social networking a big thumbs up at the General Assembly.  Facebook was unblocked shortly after.

This seems broadly representative of local churches and even denomination’s approach to the Internet.  ‘I don’t understand it so it must be bad.’  I’ve had youth workers tell me they are not allowed to have BEBO or Facebook sites, they can’t have forums on their websites and all kinds of stuff about not being online.  The reason most given is ‘Child Protection’.  What a load of nonsense.

The online world is just as safe (or unsafe) as real life.  What we should be doing is having sensible conversations about APPROPRATE online interaction with young people.  There are lost of ways to have open and transparent contact online with young people.

It’s probably a good idea for you not to IM your youth group.  But there’s no reason you can’t have a Twitter account telling them what’s coming up this week, or reminding them what to bring.

Having a group blog also let’s young people be creative in collecting content, writing and presenting what they have been up to.  A blog would give your group a higher profile in the community.  It would allow parents and supporters to see the value of your group.  You might even get new members or more funding.

So, here’s a plea.  Just because you don’t ‘get it’ don’t think it’s bad.  There are loads of tools and opportunities around to make your youth work better.  Don’t miss out because you don’t know where to start.

If you blog about your youth work, let me know.

If you would like to know more about getting online then in the next session I’ll be doing some training to get you started.  Keep an eye out on the blog and the dates pages or get in touch from the contact page.

In the meantime check YoMo’s guide to youth work blogging HERE.

I was thinking about my transition to a ‘website with a blog’ from ‘just a blog’.

What’s the difference?  In my head this site gives more opportunities to make resources available, discuss issues and point people in the direction of other helpful and interesting people and sites.  The question is ‘What’s the best way to do all that?’

Is the front page that never changes good or bad?

Does it put you off that you have to go looking for the blog?

Would you prefer the blog posts on the front page?

What kind of things would you like to see on the resources, downloads and diary pages?

I guess I’m in the process of working out what this site will be and how both I and you will be able to use it and get the most out of it.

There is a poll in the sidebar.  Please take some time to vote and also to leave your comments about what you would value from this site.

Thanks.

Stewart

Hi!

Welcome to my new blog home.  Thanks for dropping by.  I’ll be blogging here from now on and also posting some stuff in the other sections of the site.  As you will notice if your a reader of my previous blog, Scream Without Raising Your Voice, most of the post from there have made it over to here so they are all in the archive.  I’m still using WordPress to power the site and have been very impressed with how easy it has been to get up and running so quickly (2 days from registration to now).

A big thanks to John for all his help with this latest online adventure.  He’s selling webspace now and is VERY helpful.

So, all I need to do is to think about some stuff to write about… any ideas/suggestions/requests?

iChurch is, in my humble opinion, the best idea I’ve seen in ages.

If you are a URC congregation who either wants a website but think it is too hard to set up and run

or

are paying for web hosting, trying to design and update your site and all that

then ichurch is the answer!  For a one off fee of £100 you get your own website with a yourchurch.urc.org.uk address, a site that is already set up and really simple for anyone to update.  It runs from the URC server so no web hosting costs or any of that website hassle.

It’s a brilliant idea and one I think every congregation should take up.

I just had a great coffee (he had tea) and chat with Thomas aka headphonaught.  I’ve been reading Thomas’ blog for a while and we almost hooked up for coffee awhile back but it never quite happened.

Well, today was the day.  He’s got some great ideas and it was good to chat with someone who’s looking beyond the here and now.  I think there is much mileage in what we talked about and hope it can become a reality.  Watch this space.

Oh, and I smacked my head off a concrete beam.  It hurt.  A lot.  And it bled.  A bit.

In other news… I got a new bag.  My messenger bag is hurting my shoulder.

Class was good.  We looked at blogging, bookmarking, rss and tags.  All very useful stuff but I think some of my classmates might need more convincing!

Today is CONNECTED and we’re mostly online and playing with Bebo, Facebook and Habbohotel… more to come…

We’re making podcasts, playing with LastFM and have created a new page using Ning called URConnected and a wiki page.  Thanks to Ewan for a great day full of information and ideas.

Today was the first of my new class at ICC on Communication.  It’s a first year class on the Youth Work and Theology course so Today was one of their first classes!  We talked about (well I talked most) the internet and some tools for keeping in touch with their young people like Bebo and Facebook but also about blogging, texting and Flickr.

We’ve started our own class blog at http://y141.wordpress.com so feel free to pay us a wee visit as we try to work out what communication is and how it works.