I’ve had a lot of problems with Spam on this blog recently due to some changes with plug-ins. For some reason or other my hosting server can’t contact to Akismet so I’m trying out some other options which ultimately seem less than good! Anyone got some helpful suggestions?
What all this means for you, dear reader, is that you may have to put up with slow page loading and odd comments with unhelpful links for a short while until I figure out a more permanent solution. Sorry!
Archive for the 'Media' Category
I recently came across these amazing animated videos and have been stunned about both the quality and content of them.
Created by the BBC for Newsround (the kids news programme), the series of five tells the stories of real children living in poverty and difficult circumstances in the UK. Watching them brought back many memories of visiting families during my time at The WIRE.
These could be a great resource for talking with young people about poverty. It can be very easy to focus on global poverty and overlook the issues here at home. Watch the first video below and then go to the Newsround website to see the others.
ht to Si Parkin
Before Christmas I was contacted by the monthly publication Youth Work Now to write an opinion piece for the January issue of the magazine. I decided to base my article on a post I wrote back in November about findings of ADHD medication. Here is my piece that was published in the magazine today:
Drugs don’t always work for ADHD sufferers
I’ve worked with many young people with behaviour problems and hyperactive disorders since I started out in youth work around eight years ago. I’ve lost count of the number of conversations I’ve had with concerned families about how their child is “out of control†or “needs sorting out†because they are unable to cope with the erratic behaviour.
Invariably over time, most of these families have turned to their GP for support and the young person has been diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). They have then been started on a course of medication with varying results.
When working with medicated young people, I find that some practically become vegetables when their tablets kick in - they are virtually unable to hold a normal conversation or take part in sessions. Others become aggressive, depressed or suicidal as the effects wear off. At times I’ve had to work with parents to administer the medication at the right time in order to get the best possible behaviour from individuals. This convoluted effort just to get participation from a young person has always sat uneasily with me.
There are of course many who have been helped by ADHD medication, but to me it has always seemed an easy solution to a difficult problem. That’s why a recent long-term study into its effects got me quite excited!
The ‘Multimodal Treatment Study of Children with ADHD’ by the University of Buffalo in the US followed the treatment of around 600 children in the US from the 1990s. Although researchers found medication to be helpful for up to three years, one of the study’s co-authors said there were “no beneficial effects†of using the medication long-term. In fact, the impact was seemingly negative, as the children and young people involved failed to grow at the normal rate.
Much of our current ADHD treatment strategy is based on a 1999 report, which concluded that medication works better than behavioural therapy after one year. But the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) is reviewing its stance on ADHD drugs, which should give rise to other options for families struggling to cope.
Hopefully this will mean fewer vegetative young people and less reliance on medication. It may also enable youth workers to be more creative in delivering activities to young people suffering from the disorder without betraying the values inherent in our work.
Happy New Year!
This time last year I posted my favourite stuff of 2006, and there’s already been a whole slew of bloggers doing the same thing for 2007. So to jump on the bandwagon, here’s my top 3 of everything…
Books
Although I’ve read quite a few books this year, most of them have been around a while and are nothing new, so these 3 are the ones that have influenced me most this year.
- Contemplative Youth Ministry: I found this a really inspiring and helpful challenge to get back to ‘being with’ young people instead of running programmes.
- Purpose Driven Youth Ministry: Although quite programme driven, this is an excellent resource for planning and understanding what you do with young people.
- The Radical Reformission: an excellent call for Christians to be relevant to our culture.
Music
- Arcade Fire - Neon Bible: great songs with deep themes laid over giant, sweeping orchestral sounds.
- Block Party - A Weekend In The City: I missed Silent Alarm, the original release by Bloc Party, so this album was an eye opener. Strong melody and beats with quirky lyrics.
- Tim Hughes - Holding Nothing Back: simply one of the best written and produced modern worship albums.
For more music that I love, visit my Last.fm profile.
Movies
- This Is England: (released last year but only watched recently) gritty, but beautifully shot in the north of England, it follows one young lad’s friendships and struggles.
- Ratatouille: a gentle and fun animated movie that follows a slightly different story to the usual Pixar fare.
- The Bourne Ultimatum: a good ending to the trilogy and much better than the second installment, Bourne finally finds out the truth about his past.
Websites
- Facebook: the all-conquering social networking website that brings together various elements from around the web under one playful roof.
- Last.fm: a revolution in music sharing and discovery where you build a profile simply by listening to your favourite music and then share it around the web (including Facebook)!
- Netvibes: an alternative homepage to iGoogle that has a lot more options and works faster too!
TV
- Heroes: gripping story of people finding out they have super powers.
- Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares: He’s rude and arrogant, but he makes great TV! You watch it because it’s terrifying!
- My Name Is Earl: Season 2 really developed the characters and it was funnier than ever!
So what was your best? It’d be good to see some posts from friends who haven’t written anything for a while (Mumf, Kirsty, Ben, Pete).
I was reading Dave Johnson’s post about what rss feeds he subscribes to and it got me thinking it would be good to recommend a few of the blogs that I read too.
I subscribe to hundreds of different feeds from around the web ranging from youth ministry and human interest through to technology and research. By grouping them into categories in Google Reader, I skim through a lot of the content by browsing titles or headings.
I could list a whole host of great blogs, but here are the ones I find myself reading most frequently:
- ASBO Jesus: some great cartoon insights into the Christian world.
- Chris Curtis: film obsessive and schoolswork blogger.
- Curious In Ibiza: life in Ibiza with 24-7 Prayer
- Life in Student Ministry: support and resources for youth ministers
- Pink Lady: thoughtful youth worker in Hereford
- Postsecret: creative confession of secrets through a mail-in art project.
- Tim Abbott: youth work, topical debates and theology
- youthblog: news and info on relevant UK youth work and ministry
- ysmarko: links, research and thoughts on youth ministry
It’s funny to think how important feeds have become to me. It’s now part of my daily habit to get news and information from around the world brought straight to my reader. Also the real-life connections I’ve made with people through blogging has been great!
So what are your favourite blogs?
You may have noticed a link appear at the top of the page to ’shop’. This because I’ve added an Amazon Associates store to this website. Basically it’s an opportunity for me to promote books, resources and materials that I’ve found helpful in my youth work. Over time, the products will grow but for now there are already some classics like Purpose Driven Youth Ministry and Growing Souls available.
On the right-hand side, in the sidebar, you can see some of the products that I’ve added to the store already. Click through or use the link at the top to have a look and why not buy something that could be useful in your own work! Also if you have any recommendations for me, then leave a message in the comments.
Reaching out without selling out
Although I’ve known of Pastor Mark Driscoll for some time due to his exposure in the emerging church scene, I’d never read anything of his directly until a friend gave me this to read during our recent holiday. I have to say, that although sceptical when I picked it up, I loved this book!
The main thrust of the book is about getting back to the business of sharing the gospel with the world by being present in the various cultures around us. Driscoll argues that to fulfill this mission we must have equal emphasis on the gospel, the culture and the church. To leave one out leads to parachurch, liberalism or fundamentalism. For examples and explanations of this, read the introduction.
Reformission is a radical call for Christians and Christian churches to recommit to living and speaking the gospel, and to doing so regardless of the pressures to compromise the truth of the gospel or to conceal its power within the safety of the church.
I found the whole argument rather compelling and it certainly reinforces my own experiences about the relationship between gospel, culture and church. In fact, I agreed with pretty much everything he was saying! Throughout the book he punctuates chapters with real-life interviews with people who are living out ‘reformission’ and therefore back up his argument.
Driscoll has a really honest yet direct writing style which is bound to get up the nose of certain traditional Christians. For example:
Doesn’t the story sound like the plot of a trashy, daytime television talk show? The God-Man is born to a teenage virgin in an animal stall, grows up with a blue-collar dad in a dumpy rural town, and has a weird cousin named John, who lives in the woods and survives on a steady diet of bugs, sugar, and repentance.
I would highly recommend this book if you’ve ever longed to see Jesus transform the world around you but become disheartened by the evil in the world and the traditions within the church. Driscoll helpfully puts all these struggles into context and explains an exciting way forwards; reformission!
This week I’ve had a number of discussions with Christian friends who were planning to go see The Golden Compass movie as a fun-filled family outing. No problem there! But when I asked these people if they were going to have a chat with their kids after seeing the movie, I received a number of blank stares. Now I’m never one for jumping on a bandwagon, but the lack of understanding of the themes contained in the movie by parents was quite surprising. It seems the predictable Christian boycott outcry (a la ‘Harry Potter’) has passed a large number of people by.
I’ve not yet seen the movie nor read the books, but a few years back I bought Northern Lights (The original English title for The Golden Compass before it was Americanized) for a non-Christian friend without realising the strong anti-church themes contained in the story. This led to a great deal of discussion between us (much of which has been helpful) and I’m thankful for the dialogue. My hope is that other Christians will take the opportunity this movie presents to talk about the issues it raises rather than attack them as heretical. In fact some Christians see the movie as purely positive.
What Pullman encourages is unmediated, critical thinking – the only antidote to the mental stupor that today’s culture cultivates in young people. And Pullman does so in multiple ways. For example, by turning the familiar story lines of Genesis, Narnia, and the like, on their heads – thereby prompting the reader to reimagine those stories for him- or herself. In short, Pullman doesn’t tell his readers what to think, but how to think. And to think, period. This, I suspect, is what Pullman’s critics really find unnerving.
For more in-depth and thoughtful responses to the movie, check out Tim Abbott’s and Dr. Headley’s posts on the subject with some great links to other resources so you can make up your own minds.
I just had to link to this great youtube video of some young inventors being interviewed. What better way to return to blogging? 
Thanks to Marko for this gem.
Radiohead’s new album In Rainbows was released on download earlier this week to great anticipation from fans. Their first release since 2003, In Rainbows is only available directly from the Radiohead website, but in a ground-breaking move, fans get to choose how much they pay for the music - anything from the 45p processing fee upwards! NME has an interesting article showing how much fans have decided to pay and the average seems to be around £5.
However since the release there’s been a huge backlash around the internet due to the compression of the download files. Each track is encoded in DRM Free 160kbps MP3 which is generally fine for listening to on MP3 players, but pretty poor for decent systems as it loses all the intricacies and detail of the music. It now appears that the low quality download is only a promotion for the full high-quality CD album to be released next year. This has angered a lot of fans who feel duped into buying this inferior version even though they set the price they paid:
First and foremost, all of Radiohead’s previous albums were already available as MP3s encoded at 320 kilobits per second…
Second, most took issue with when Radiohead chose to announce that In Rainbows would be available at 160 kbps — after the majority of their fans had already paid for the download.
I’ve yet to download it myself. The 160MP3 will be fine for my macbook, but not for my home stereo or headphones. I think I’ll probably pay a smaller amount for the download and if I really enjoy the album then I’ll but the full physical copy when released to appreciate the detail.
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