A YouTube Education

January 19, 2016

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Technology has exploded over the past few years!  Whether it’s been radios, televisions, cell phones, personal computers, the Internet, or tablets we are constantly being shown a new product that can help make our life just a little bit easier.  As a recent college graduate, I can tell you that YouTube helped me graduate college and has helped keep me update on youth culture. In college, my fellow classmates watched television but it was slowly becoming replaced by Netflix (if you can shell out a monthly payment) or YouTube (the free alternative).  As the new family minister, I’m sure there are a few people out there, that are wondering how is it easy for me to relate to youth and children.  To answer that question, I do a lot of reading but I also expose myself to the world of YouTube.

YouTube is a world where you can watch videos from pranks, movie trailers, make-up tutorials, video game play, music videos, goofy videos, and even educational videos.  What makes it even more amazing, is that a video can be a couple minutes long or it can go on for an hour.  So you may wonder how you can use YouTube as a tool. In genera,l I use YouTube to update myself on youth culture and also to allow myself some small study or work breaks.  But, YouTube can be used for a lot of different reasons as well.

So how can YouTube be used as a tool in working with Youth? It can be used in a lot of different ways, but first you have to figure out what is interesting to your student, son, or daughter.  Whatever they are interested in, you can most likely type it into YouTube and find a video that tells you more about it or shows you a clip of someone doing something.  One of my personal favorite channels to watch is called FineBros.  Two brothers, Benny and Rafi Fine look up popular videos on YouTube and then have special episodes where kids, teens, adults, and elders react to a variety of different videos.  It’s excellent at showing you what is going on in the world of YouTube and could bring up and interesting conversation with children and youth.  They also have a second channel called React where you can watch all the same individuals play retro or modern games, participate in memory games, expose kids to new foods, asking people questions, and videos where you are shown a variety of funny clips and the goal is to watch them all without laughing.

If, you are just looking for more funny and videos to give your brain a break, feel free to check out the channel Good Mythical Morning.  Good Mythical Morning is a channel where two life-long friends and an amazing cast put together a video everyday (Monday-Friday).  Every video is released early in the morning and videos vary from will various foods taco or ice cream, where the two guys try to create unusual food combinations that haven’t been created before.  They also answer questions that people send in and share weird and unusual things with you.  Every video is made to be family friendly and is guaranteed to make you smile and or laugh at least once.

So if you haven’t already begun exploring YouTube, give it a try. It could be the tool you’ve been looking for.