25
Apr, 2021
digital lock-in

Digital Lock-In April 2021

Digital Lock-In April 2021

We raised over £200!

We managed to raise £230 through donations on Just Giving! 

Firstly, we want to say a MASSIVE thank you to everyone who donated! We were blown away by the amount of support people showed for Connect Alloa, including volunteers, current and former members and their families.

The money raised from the event is going to be used to organise a well-deserved party for our young people once Covid-19 guidelines allow.

Hopefully, we will be able to meet again for in-person events over the summer and we’re really looking forward to reconnecting with everyone! 

digital lock-in fundraising total

What is A Digital Lock-In?

Basically, between 11am and 8pm on Saturday, April 10th we hosted a day-long session on our Discord server. Our young people were allowed to attend for however long they wanted, from a short 30 minute catch up to staying for a few hours!

Throughout the day we had regular screen breaks. We also included activities that would get everyone moving, from a scavenger hunt for items you could find around the house to body percussion (yup, it’s a thing).

Back in 2019, we hosted an in-person lock-in event at St. Mungo’s Parish Church. It was a sponsored day of activities and games. We had planned on hosting a second lock-in event in 2020, but – like pretty much everything else – we had to change our plans and adapt to a virtual lock-in event instead. 

Since we still couldn’t host an in-person event, we decided to keep our 2021 lock-in digital too!

Activities

Throughout the day we hosted a range of activities, from our at-home scavenger hunt to playing Among Us, to D&D and discussion topics. We had a brilliant time hanging out with the young people and volunteers!

To find out more about what sort of online activities we get up to, check out our blog post on the topic!

Join Connect Alloa!

Hopefully, we’ll be able to host some in-person youth group sessions when Covid-19 guidelines allow. We are looking into running some more outdoor activities in the summer months, so make sure to follow us on social media for updates!

Thinking about joining Connect Alloa? Find our registration form here!

Stay safe!

13
Apr, 2021
Online Activities

Online Activities

Online Activities

We’ve had the same dilemma as everyone else over the past year: how do you adapt to life online? Since moving our youth group sessions online, we’ve had to get creative about what activities we can offer our young people. Using Discord, a platform that lets us talk and hang out virtually as a group, Connect Alloa has been able to offer regular digital youth nights throughout lockdown. Over the past year, we’ve adapted different activities to make them online-friendly and found some new games to play as a group.

Online Scavenger Hunts

Basically, how this works is someone reads out a list of items for our young people and volunteers to find. These items can be simple – a book, a bowl, a hat – or a bit more personal – something related to a hobby or a picture.

During a group call, everyone gets told the list of objects at the same time. The person who collects all their items first and gets back to their screen fastest wins.

This is a great warm up activity and it also gets the young people away from their screens for part of the session. It’s also usually a good discussion starter if someone brings an unusual item and it really lets the young people share some of their hobbies/interests with the group too!

Among Us

Among Us is an online multiplayer game that’s free to download to your phone. You’re on a spaceship with your crewmates, trying to complete a bunch of tasks to keep everything running properly (why these small blob people have such terrible, constantly malfunctioning spacecrafts is never really addressed). However, at least one player will secretly be an ‘imposter.’ Their job is to try and kill everyone else on the spaceship, one by one, without anyone realising its them.

When a player discovers a body, they can hit the report button and start a group vote on who everyone things the killer is. If the majority of players vote for the same person, that player gets chucked off the spaceship. Pick correctly and the crewmates win. Pick the wrong person and the killer gets another chance. 

Jackbox Games

We also have a Jackbox Games account, which gives us access to a whole bunch of online multiplayer games. All a young person needs to do to take part is go the Jackbox website and type in the game code given during group.

Jackbox Games often encourage problem solving skills and creativity. A lot the games involve coming up with funny answers or responses, with points being awarded by other players for good answers.

jackbox games

Dungeons and Dragons

Another activity we’ve been able to host online has been Dungeons and Dragons. Since Discord allows everyone to participate in group voice and/or video calls, we’ve been able to adapt D&D to suit our digital sessions.

D&D also encourages creativity, team work and problem solving, as pointed out by Ethan Gilsdorf in this Ted article: ‘How playing Dungeons & Dragons has helped me be more connected, creative and compassionate.’ 

Suggestions

At Connect Alloa we are constantly looking for feedback and suggestions from our young people and volunteers. If there’s a new or different activity you want to try at one of our sessions, let us know!

Hopefully, we’ll be able to host some in-person youth group sessions when Covid-19 guidelines allow. We are looking into running some more outdoor activities in the summer months, so make sure to follow us on social media for updates!

Interested in joining Connect Alloa? Find our registration form here!

Stay safe everyone!

What is Digital Youth Work?

What is Digital Youth Work?

How do you conduct youth work during a pandemic? Since March last year, we’ve had to get creative here at Connect Alloa about how we engage with our young people. From coming up with new digital activities to hosting Walk and Talk meet ups last summer, it’s been a bit of a learning curve for us all!

Digital Youth Sessions

Currently, we are running online sessions three days a week: Tuesdays, Fridays, and Saturdays. To facilitate this we’ve been using Discord.

Haven’t heard of it? Discord is a digital platform that was originally created for online gamers. It was a way to build an online community and provide a space for group discussions.

Discord allows us to host a secure server only accessible to our members, volunteers and staff. We use Discord to collect and organise our different projects and session topics, from Dungeons and Dragons to online games.

Discord also allows us to have group discussions in real-time. It’s like Zoom, but without the stress of being on camera! Using Discord and continuing to meet as a group has allowed Connect Alloa to stay connected throughout lockdown.

digital youth work

Staying Social

With everyone stuck at home over the past year, it has been more important than ever to create fun and inclusive digital spaces where young people can meet, talk and stay social. Providing a stable support network and a break from the stresses of daily life is vital.

Young people have been particularly badly affected by the pandemic, especially in terms of their mental health. Research from The Prince’s Trust found that 1 in 4 young people were struggling to cope during the pandemic, with many feeling anxious and depressed during lockdown. 

Through continuing to host regular youth nights and online sessions, Connect Alloa aims to ensure all our young people have access to supportive community.

The Future

If this past year has taught us anything, it’s that you can’t always predict what’s coming next.

Moving forward into 2021, we’re hoping to be able to transition back to in-person sessions in some capacity. However, our priority will always be the safety of our young people, volunteers, staff and wider community, so we will continue to operate online until it’s safe to meet in-person. Hopefully, when that time comes we’ll see some familiar faces as well as some new ones!

Interested in joining Connect Alloa? Or do you know a young person who might be? Please fill out our registration form and we’ll be in touch!

Resources

Mental health support: See Me Scotland, Shout 85258, SAMH.

Follow Connect Alloa on social media to stay up to date with our sessions and learn more about what sort of activities we do!