The Only Screen for Summer?

Day two.  Post an awesome sleep-away camp adventure.  And, along with my two-shades-browner, one-inch-taller son, I find myself once again disturbed by familiar unwanted guests in the house, albeit of the virtual nature.

Two days ago we made the hike up to New Hampshire’s breathtaking white mountains to pick up my fourteen-year-old, Jake, and already I am yelling at him to turn off his video game.  I know many of you have been wrestling with those oddly realistic animated sports stars and beckoning monsters for weeks now (weeks = eternity), and are desperately seeking some kind of remedy to get your kids off the screen, outside and on the move.  If only there was a Vitamin O (“Keep in reach of children”) that would mentally orient our kids O-ffline and O-ut the door.

According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, the average kid, ages 8-18, spends more than seven hours a day looking at screen media.  Yikes!  Of course, I am no Luddite, but for summer, the only screen kids should really use is sunscreen.

Behind the Screen: Digital Daughter, Teen Mentor and Superstar Lauren Galley

Lauren Galley, DDA, Teen Mentor and Founder of Girls Above Society

Like most girls today who are growing up tethered to their tech - connecting and socializing via the screen - many of my Digital Daughter Ambassadors (DDAs) have been profoundly influenced by experiences with cyber bullying, sexting, text dating, FOMO and the like.  I'm honored to introduce you to my DDA Lauren, who has not only risen above and beyond her own middle school tech nightmare, but is doing something about it in a really big and meaningful way…

Meet Lauren Galley, teen mentor and founder of Girls AboveSociety, her non-profit born out of her own personal angst-ridden experience and a desire to help girls everywhere cope and thrive in our digital world. 

Back in January, Lauren and I met on Twitter (of course!) and I continue to be blown away by her dizzying schedule, pure dedication and unending list of accomplishments. At age 20, she has just finished her sophomore year at SHSU and is pursuing a Masters in Psychology. Lauren is a TEDx Speaker, Huffington Post Contributor, Official Ambassador for Secret Deodorant’s Mean Stinks Campaign, and just wrote a book, “Kissing Frogs:In Search of Prince Charming.” Most recently, she is working on a course in cyber citizenship for the Texas Education Agency,

I asked Lauren about social media, social anxiety, the importance of speaking articulately and with confidence, and her generation’s future.  Here's what she had to say...

Hillary Says it Likes She Means it!

Are you excited for #HillarysBigAnnouncement?  Whether or not you are a Democrat or a fan of Hillary Rodham Clinton, she IS the first female front-runner for the biggest office in the land.  

Hillary Rodham Clinton is surely the expert at "Saying it Like She Means it!" and was profiled in my Top 10 Female Role Models and Communicators of 2014.  As a powerful and passionate advocate for girls' and women's rights globally, Clinton has often said that there cannot be true democracy unless women's voices are heard.

Clinton is using social media to announce her candidacy and although she is a 67-year-old baby boomer and a grandmother, you can be sure that she will be capitalizing on all social channels and digital marketing tools to convince us - Gen X, Y, Z, fellow baby boomers and The Greatest Generation" - as to why she deserves to be our next president.  It will be the most digitally-fused election to date.

Give Them Roots, Wings and Virtual “Busy Signals” – The Greatest Generation on the App Generation

What does The Greatest Generation think of the App Generation? 

Upon surveying her friends, my very wise 80-year-old mom explained that when it comes to social media and cell phones, there is a wide range of understanding, but almost a unanimous opinion…they are concerned. 

 

We may giggle along with eSurance’s commercial where to save time, Grandma Beatrice literally posts her vacation photos “on her wall.”   But there is some brilliant truth, and several layers of insight, when her friend declares, “That’s not how it works.  That’s not how any of this works!”

How does it all work?  Or, is the better question, “Is it all working?”  When it comes to parenting and texting, my mother is especially concerned. 

“Why do Amanda and Jake need to text you from school with every little thing?  How are they suppose to make any of their own decisions when they are wirelessly tethered to you?”

We all grew up in the age of corded phones, telephone booths, busy signals and collect calls.  If we needed our parents, we could connect, but it took some effort and we often had to wait it out.  But, now our text-messaging enabled smartphones offer instant gratification.  And, knowing that our teens have a phone, literally in their back pockets, alleviates anxiety for both parents and kids.

No doubt, we are living through a sociolinguistic transformation brought on by the ubiquitous Internet.  Not just a media culture shift (radio, TV, computer, Smartphone), but also a communications culture shift where the majority of us are texting junkies, and use hash tags and smiley faces to communicate.  With our digital natives as the experts at putting all of these new communications tools into practice, we are, fortunately or unfortunately, compelled to follow.

Growing Up Female & Social - Part II: What Teens Wish We Understood

Our parents had it so easy…a letter was theirs to be sneakily read, a phone call, to be eavesdropped.  But we live in a world of pinging secret text messages. Codes, acronyms and apps never to be translated – or even known.  It’s another shift.  A new vocabulary with apps that are missing vowels (tumblr), and acronyms that are meant to leave us out of the story (PIR: Parent in Room).

Where is Benedict Cumberbatch (a.k.a. Sherlock, Alan Turing) when you need him?

Welcome to the new reality.  But what feels like a tidal shift to us, is just a new software update for our teens.

When I bring up teens and social media with my friends, we share the eye roll; the heavy sign; the shaking of the head.  And, inevitably, one of us gives voice to the old lament – the refrain of generations past, “What’s to become of kids today?”

In this, “Growing Up Female and Social - Part II,” I reveal my Digital Daughter Ambassadors answers to what they think we don’t get about social media and what they would like us to know.  

Growing Up Female and Social – Survey Says…

Digital Daughters

It’s 2015, and our kids are 'gramming, texting, Snapchatting, tweeting and streaming.  

The distracting noise level on social channels is amplifying while the length of thoughtful prose is diminishing. 

Don’t despair…

Social media and its octopus-like tentacles that reach out and poke our kids – cajoling them to “like,” “follow” and “post” – are intimidating, and worrying, especially when new apps crop up like weeds.  But when I looked to my Digital Daughter Ambassadors (DDAs) – tweens, teens and young women from around the country – to get insight into how they were managing with the proliferation of ways to communicate (text, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, Google+, Tumblr – and face-to-face), I found a lot of wisdom.

My very unscientific questionnaire of  “Growing Up Female and Social” is just an ear to the ground.  But I am already hearing echoes, and they offer important insights on what a diverse group of girls, my DDAs who hail from New York to Pennsylvania, Maryland to Minnesota, California to London, England - really think about social media, how they use it, and why they love it so much.

Here are some initial insights from the questionnaire, showing our girls to be wise to both the downfalls and upshots of social media.