The Smartphones as a tool in youth work training took place in the North Macedonian capital Skopje on 2 - 8 October 2024. This time I had a special role to play as I was still helping to facilitate it with my colleague Ilona.
Getting started
The first day was marked by getting to know each other and being acquainted. For example, they tried to draw their portrait or reflected on their own relationship with their smartphone. They also created a collage on this topic. They also explored the practices of the participating organizations in working with young people using mobile devices. Participants learned more about non-formal education and YouthPasses. In the afternoon, they went on to explore Skopje and the local reality through several small tasks. Upon their return, the group set the rules for living together and reflected on the day using the snowball method.
Do I perceive the smart phone else than others?
The second day was about slowly getting into the topic of using smartphones in informal activities. However, we started the day in a fun way with an activity called "Have I ever…" where participants have to switch places and whoever stays in the middle asks the next question.
This was followed by discussions in four groups:
How do you perceive smartphones as youth workers, teachers, young people or community leaders?
Do you think that smartphones can be used to develop young people's competences?
Do you use smartphones for work or study communication? If yes, how?
What do you think are the biggest challenges or barriers?
Afterwards, there was a short presentation of the results from the data collection, which was conducted through focus groups in the summer months in the Czech Republic. Participants reflected using a moving debate on a scale between yes and no, answering truthfully questions about their use of social media, which raised a great deal of discussion. Following this, they then had to work in threes to come up with an activity that would introduce and ideally prevent some of the mentioned risks or concerns about social media use for young people. Half an hour later, we could hear suggestions for interesting methods aimed at catcalling, deep fake or fake web links.
The afternoon started with a case study activity, in which participants were asked to study a case study and prepare a presentation in the form of a research poster for others. The presentations were followed by discussion and reflection on different aspects of smartphone use.
The following topics were addressed during the activity:
Youth empowerment: using technology in advocacy to influence social change
Smartphones in workplaces: the dynamics of smartphone use and adolescent well-being are positive but ephemeral
Smartphone and social media use is common in most emerging economies
Digital technologies in community engagement.
World Café about smartphones
A method called World Café has built on this. In our case, the room was divided into four question stations, with four participants at each, one of whom was designated as an ambassador and stayed for the duration of the activity to take notes and summaries observations to the incoming groups. Participants were then randomly assigned to a question and debated together for ten minutes. After the time was up, they moved on to another issue, and then another, until they had gone around and discussed everything in four rounds. At the end of the activity, the ambassadors summarized the conclusions of each topic for everyone, and discussion followed.
How can smartphones be used to support mental health initiatives?
How can we ensure digital security and privacy using smartphones?
How would people change if they could only use smartphones for 1-2 hours a day?
Do parents, schools, youth centers, cities have the right to ban the use of smartphones?
The reflection of the day was carried out using the Gallery Walk method, where each participant could make a creative summary of the past day at a pre-prepared station. It was possible to write a social media post, draw something, create a haiku, write a song depicting the day, write an object depicting the day, etc.
Free day and exploring Macedonian reality
The third day was free for participants to do whatever they wanted to soak up the reality of life in Northern Macedonia. I went to Matka Canyon near Skopje and then explored the oriental district of Čarsija and tasted the local baklava.
Specific examples
The third day was dedicated to concrete examples of using smartphones in youth work. First, there was a virtual presentation on the use of Minecraft in teaching English by Michaela A. This was followed by a short presentation and try out of working with AI, from machine learning using Teacheable Machine, to machine estimation using Quick Draw, to trying out various AI tools, from Editee, to DALL-E, to Stable Diffusion. The morning also included creating both visual and textual deliverables covering the training and its topics. And then followed a session of the program full of recommendations for practical tools and applications for working with young people.
In the afternoon, the participants were tasked with using everything they had learned up to that point to prepare a twenty-minute program for the others on a topic of interest. The activities created were then implemented later in the afternoon and part of the next morning.
Activities created:
Privilege walk focused on smartphones (Raja, Tereza)
Cat phishing game (Ebru, Petra, Sami, Mokrane)
Three creative activities using AI (Martina, Beyza)
Verifying fake information from a quiz (Stefan, Stefan)
One-on-one debate, pros and cons of using mobile phones (Nina, Ana, Dragana, Veronika)
Reflection took the form of creating a tweet (one hundred and forty characters long text) reflecting on the day.
Farewell Day
The morning focused on the Erasmus+ program and how young people can get involved. We talked about training, small-scale projects, volunteering and other opportunities. It included the preparation of an individual poster and the opportunity to share contacts and make professional friendships.
In the afternoon there was a fun quiz summarizing the whole joint program and everything the participants had learnt through the Mentimeter. This was followed by the official evaluation questionnaire of the host organization. This was followed by the last words of farewell and thanks in the form of writing messages on paper stuck on their backs, concluding the program.
