Teens, Technology, and Friendships

Teens, Technology, and Friendship

Lenhart, A. (2015).  Teens, technology and friendships.  Retrieved from: Pew Center Research.

 This report explored the new contours of friendship in the digital age. It covers the results of a national survey of teens ages 13 to 17.  According to Pew Research:

·         57% of All today’s teens have made new friends online. 

·         29% of these teens admitting they have met more than 5 friends online.

·         Boys are more likely than girls to make online friends 61% of boys compared to 52% of girls have made friends online.  Girls who have met new friends online are more likely to meet them via social media (78% vs. 52% of boys), while boys are substantially more likely to meet new friends while playing games online (57% vs. 13% of girls)

·         Older teens are more likely to make friends than younger teens- 60% of teens between the ages of 15-17 have made friends online. 

·         Texting is a huge component of socializing in a teen’s world- 55% of teens spend their time texting.  Texting is the most common way they communicate with close friends

·         Only 25% of teens spend time with friends face to face.

Here is a list of how teens communicate with their friends:

Instant messaging: 79% of all teens instant message their friends.

Social media: 72% of all teens spend time with friends via social media.

Email: 64% of all teens use email with friends.

Video chat: 59% of all teens video chat with their friends.

Video games: 52% of all teens spend time with friends playing video games.

Messaging apps: 42% of all teens spend time with friends on messaging apps such as Kik and WhatsApp.

How Teens Hang Out and Stay in Touch With Their Closest Friends:

At School-83%

Someone’s house-58%

Online-55%

Sports, club (extracurricular activity)-45%

Neighborhood-42%

Mall-23%

Church-21%

Job-6%

Other location-5%

 

 76 pages

 

Final Reflections Digital Technology

   

Final Reflections

Where do I start?  I made it! Well almost... as you can see from this post, I'm still having some technical difficulties.  I don't know where the hot pink lines came from and I've tried everything to remove them, to no avail.  It's only fitting that my last blog I would experience this, right?  There were times I felt like the lady on top when it came to completing assignments, and sometimes it was the lady on the the bottom.  From the first assignment, no from the time I registered for Digital Technology for the School Librarian, I was somewhat intimidated, that tends to happen to me, when you don’t think of yourself as very technical or technically challenged person.  I want to first say, that I’m glad that this was a required course.  I proved to myself that I can do it. I also learned that some of this new technology is not so bad.  I honestly learned something good, something I could take with me from each and every assignment, however that didn't stop me from becoming frustrated with a few (maybe several) of the assignments because I couldn’t get them to act right on my computer. 

Facebook and Twitter, I was already familiar with, I will continue to use both. I liked creating an Infographic, and using Pictochart made it fairly easy to do. Blogs/Blog Readers, I like reading other people blogs, maybe not writing them myself, as much. Youtube, Animoto, and QR Codes, I've always enjoyed Youtube videos, I especially liked seeing how librarians and students creatively used them for the library.  I will be using Animoto a lot more for book trailers, I enjoyed creating my very first.
Information Ethics and Acceptable Use Policy assignments were especially helpful to me.  I'm a little embarrassed to say, but I didn't have a clear understanding of what they were or how to present it, but because of the assignment, articles, and reading other blogs on it, I'm more confident on how to address it now. Podcasting and Screencasting, were fun, I like the audio thing.  I also had major issues with my computer and trying to record, it was a little frustrating at times.  I had to do almost eight takes with the screencast!  The verdict is still out on Online Book Communities, I will continue to use Goodreads, but I'm not so sure about the others?  Cartoons and Comics, I was thrilled with the idea of creating my very own comic,  that was until it became very time consuming and frustrating, waiting for things to upload.  Maybe it was the site or maybe it was my computer again? I do think having students create is a great idea.  Instagram and Vine were okay, I can see possibly using Instagram  with some of the ideas suggested by others. Mining PEW (150 pgs.), I think Pew Research is a great source for information and research, I will definitely continue to read the articles, and presentations.
Overall, I got a lot out of this course, great things to try in the library and share with teachers and faculty.  I put in a lot of sweat, tears, some frustration, but the knowledge gained, makes it well worth it!