http://smcdsm.ning.com/video/social-media-in-education

From post by Shane Vander Hart on February 3, 2011

We’ve lined up dates and locations for our Orientation to Mentoring sessions in the Des Moines area throughout February. This one hour training is the first step for those who are interested in mentoring.
During this orientation those who attend will receive:

1.An overview of Serve Our Youth Network and our different opportunities for mentoring (Amachi, Informal Mentoring at Polk County Youth Services and Second Chance Juvenile Mentoring Initiative).

2.An overview of mentoring in general and its rewards and benefits.

3.Basic requirements for mentors and our application, screening and selection process.There is no obligation to become a mentor if you attend, but this is a great way to learn more before you jump in.

Here are our orientation times and locations:

■Saturday, February 12 (7:30a-8:30a) at Smokey Row (1910 Cottage Grove Ave. in Des Moines)

■Tuesday, February 15 (7:30p-8:30p) at Panera Bread (2310 SE Delaware Ave. in Ankeny)

■Monday, February 21 (7:00p – 8:00p) at Grounds for Celebration – Beaverdale (2645 Beaver Ave. in Des Moines)

If you would like to attend one of these orientations, while it isn’t necessary, we would appreciate it if you would RSVP. You can do so by contacting me at (515) 321-5077 or send me an email to shanev@serveouryouth.org.

 The 1st Annual Evening of Entertainment in support of Family Directions of Iowa. All proceeds will benefit Family Directions of Iowa’s community family programs.

Tickets: Available in advance for $35 (21 and over only please)

http://www.familydirectionsiowa.org/

Featured Guests: Musical Performance by John Cheatem Dueling Pianos with Tony Bohnenkamp & Jared Hall Emceed by Big Ken & Colleen of Star 102.5 Raffle Items. Hor d’oerves provided by Noodle Zoo. Cash bar available.

www.amazon.com

Testimony from a mom about this book:

“How Zach developed such clear values. Beginning when Zach was 5 we talked about a value (same one for a month) as part of our evening ritual. It helped him have deep understanding of character as evidenced by his testimony. This book was a great resource for the nightly value discussion”

1) the economy, jobs and raising kids with limited resources

2) the state of public schools

3) what the future looks like for our kids

4) what effect social media has on kids “socialization”

5) physical fitness and diets of kids

6) the effect of legalizing pot on teens

7) the new crop of “legal” drugs like K2 kids are using

8 ) bullying in the schools

9) how bored kids are with the blackboard and text books  in this digital-technological-internet-social media-gaming-interactive age

10) the decline of faith, values, empathy, morals, kindness, respect and compassion instilled in many kids today

11 ) On a POSITIVE NOTE how much my kids mean to me and how I always want to be their Mom First

Terrific blog community of active pregnant and parenting moms.

But most of my “hates” will be resolved as I get used to the phone and I love all of the things I can do on-the-go! So overall I would not want to go back to my old “dumb” phone.

As I mentioned, I once grazed the screen with my cheek while speaking to someone and ended up surfing porn on the net. But my most beloved Android moment was when my 22-year-old @Jordan Gaulke posted a message on Facebook asking me why I wrote “nrrrookklin.ju” on my Facebook post. He said “Did you mean Brooklyn Jew?” Then my 19-year-old comments “Julian’s first Facebook post.” Indeed Julian had managed to unlock the phone (sliding the touch screen over) open the #Facebook browser, type a message randomly and post it to my FB page!

Slogan: Android – so easy (too easy) – even a 23-month-old can do it!

Babies loving phones is nothing new. My 22-year-old loved phones when he was 22-months-old (and actually never used the phone for years and then become as fascinated as a baby again as soon as there were cell phones and unlimited text messaging plans and now internet access and Facebook apps).

The difference 22 years ago was that it was difficult for a baby to actually dial a long distance number in any sort of sequence that would dial anything, let alone someone you actually knew. However, now by complete accident and within seconds babies can dial lots of people. Statistically for some reason there are some people that he dials more than others.

A few months back, however, my son actually dialed my cousin out in Oregon. I have no problem with my cousin and whenever we see each other we make promises about keeping up with each other. But the reality is I hear from him more when his computer has been hacked and I am getting spam emails from him than any other time. We definitely don’t talk by phone and at the time when my son randomly dialed him we had not spoken for about a year.

So what do you do when your cousin excitedly says, “Hey its great to hear from you!” Do you say, oh sorry, my toddler called you not me, I was actually not thinking of you right now at all?

We ended up having a nice long conversation in the middle of me trying to cook dinner because I told him I was just calling to catch up.

So Jeff, love you, and I look forward to catching up with you again the next time Julian calls on my #Android. Until then, please change your E-mail password, I got another link to an “enhancement” product again today.

Then she writes back …not cammomile.com… dang spell check… cabmobile.com. Her “smart” phone had decided that what she meant was cammomile, not cabmobile and it auto corrected her web address before she sent it out to everyone!

I wrote back that Cammomile is actually a pretty interesting Fashion Line web site! So check it out at http://www.cammomile.com or if you need a cab http://www.cabmobile.com or just call 515-289-9800 (I don’t envy the person with the phone number one number off that gets called all of the time for a cab from drunk dialers).

Thanks for the tip @Barbie Sundet-Bush and @John Bush

Used to be a teen boy might get caught with some Playboys under the mattress. Now Moms have computers and porn sites to contend with causing computer viruses and who knows what to the mind with some of the content on these sites.

Note to teens from a social media mom: DO NOT SURF PORN SITES. But for heaven sake, DO NOT surf porn on your Mom’s anything! But really please just do not surf porn sites.

• I played Rock Band 3 with my teens and found out I can sing, but I stink at any instrument!
• Shared a cocktail with my two 22-year-old sons. That is a weird experience to be out at dinner and have your kid buy you a drink!
• I also played with my 22-month-old’s new Leap Frog play laptop which comes equipped with a button for fake blogging and also an email button that tells him he has e-mail. You can actually go online and through a USB port customize his e-mail on the little play laptop!

My sons immediately took pictures of me playing Rock Band and posted it on Facebook thinking this was funning (and it was).  Then with the 22-month-old already having a little computer exposing him to the idea of blogging, it really got me thinking about “social media etiquette” in this very public world of communication.

My father, who is 66, and my grandmother in Florida in her 80′s are both on Facebook. My dad actually “unfriended” my 22-year-olds for using too much of the F bomb with their friends talking on Facebook (both very nice boys and very nice friends – but they want to talk like they are just chatting with each other as if they are hanging out at each other’s apartments or at a bar). At times posts could even be about faith, but peppered with the other stuff my Dad finally deleted.

Recently one of my son’s friends who had to work over the holiday at a large insurance company posted that all of the customers could go somewhere less than friendly for the holiday.  A few of his co-workers laughed at him and teased that hopefully the company isn’t reading his FB page.

I don’t think my son’s feelings were too hurt about Grandpa (although I think that Grandpa enjoyed the pictures and keeping up with him).  But the latter issue with the work place is really no laughing issue.

So I ran across this wonderful and simple food for thought and good advice I will pass on from A Mom First and a Business perspective (I am stealing this from Nate Riggs http://bx.businessweek.com/social-media-marketing/view?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnateriggs.com%2F2010%2F12%2F03%2Fmike-brown-social-media-policy%2F post on December 3, 2010: Mike Brown on The World’s Simplest Social Media Policy):

Behold the world’s simplest social media policy: “Will what you’re about to share online offend, surprise, or shock your

• Spouse
• Mother
• Employer (current or future)
• Clients (current or future)
• Business partners (current or future)
• Coworkers
• Children

in a way which critically jeopardizes your relationship? If you answer even one “Yes” for this short list of people, think long and hard before publishing your content.”

What do you think?

Several months after signing up, my oldest son was going on and on about this “new” thing called Facebook. I had exceeded the expiration date for being a fresh, cool mom long ago (or so they thought). So in the ultimate coolness comeback, and my last and final glorious claim to it, I told my then 17-year-old son, “Oh that, I’ve been on there for a long time.” Ha! Take that Jordan. To make matters worse, my mom (their Grandma) signed up right after me AND she signed up my grandma for Facebook too. So right after joining, my son got a friend request from his 79-year-old great-grandma.

I might have been a little ahead of the curve, but turns out 79% of moms are on Facebook. Teens be warned! Read about moms on Facebook here: http://ht.ly/3sQbu

According to the 2010 Mom Social Influencer segmentation study by BabyCenter, what this basically means is that I use the computer to communicate and to gain and share information. I’m on Facebook, I use Twitter, I blog regularly and I use sites such as Youtube or Hulu for entertainment purposes. All this time I’ve been doing this, I had no idea that I, or women like me, have created a whole new “subset” of women. As a matter of fact, as I write this blog entry I am updating my status and chatting with a friend on Facebook, reviewing my Twitter feeds and watching the new Maroon 5 video on Youtube.

Marketers have narrowed us down into two broad categories: the Influencers and the Influenced. Within those categories we have been subcategorized as the field expert, the lifecaster and the pro in the Influencer category and the butterflies and the audience in the Influenced segment. After reviewing the description of each of these “mom influencers” and the percentage of “overall influence” we carry in social media, it strikes me funny that there has been so much time and effort put into studying and categorizing moms who use the internet. In my view, its not nearly as involved or in-depth as these studies fluffed with all the marketing speak imply. As a matter of fact, I think I can break it down into simpler, more real-to-life tags.

In my study, there are two categories of “social media moms”:
· The Bored
· The Bored who also want to make a little money

Let me expand on these categories. First, The Bored. These moms are online nearly every waking minute of the day because they have no other form of socialization. They usually have multiple children, typically not-yet-school age and are slowly being driven in sane by the constant demand on their time, the redundancy of Barney or Dora the Explorer, and the regular need to clean bottoms and replace dirty diapers. The Bored use their computers as their window to the real world since they do not get out of the house much anymore. They sneak on the computer to catch up on newsworthy items so they can carry on a somewhat intelligent conversation on those rare occasions they actually get to speak to another adult, they use social websites like Facebook to keep up with their friends so they don’t have to pick up the phone and risk the chance of a meltdown in the background, and they surf the net to find funny things to preoccupy their minds so they will laugh instead of doing what they really feel like doing…cry.

The second category, are The Bored moms who have realized that by doing what they do anyway, they can actually make money at it. There are some “mommy blogs” that are followed by thousands of other moms, single women, and even men. These are gold mines to the marketers’ eyes. These women are the glue that hold the delicate fiber of the cyber world and the consumer product universe together. These lucky moms will have product marketers begging them for product reviews or giveaways on their sites and some even offer some kind of compensation. Moms all around the world are taking advantage of this opportunity to put a few extra dollars in their pocket, and why not? Chances are they didn’t get into this for that reason, they were already out there blogging about things they liked, things they didn’t like, passing on advice, sharing mom horror stories, suggesting products they’ve tried or services they’ve used and swapping coupons or other money-saving ideas with their readers.

So, really, the “social mom” is not a tough nut to crack. We like to laugh like anyone else, we like to be social and make friends even if we can’t get out of the house to do it, and we like to learn and grow and share our newfound knowledge with others. If that makes us “influencers,” then more power to us. Just be warned marketers, we are also quite crafty and could use this information against you!

What category of “social media mom” do you fall into? Check out the whole Babycenter survey here

http://www.babycenter.com/100_-the-babycenter-174-2010-mom-social-influencer-report-reveal_10332899.bc

Sidenote: I come from a marketing/PR background so I am always interested in the new marketer targets. Being a mom on the ‘net, I found this one especially interesting and worth sharing!