Talking Youth Work

Board Games with Sérgio Gonçalves, episode 10

Imagine, this is the 10th episode, and we are joined by our good friend Sérgio Gonçalves, a trainer that has a passion for board games.

Sérgio has developed board games for Education and in this conversation he shares some of the ways board games can be used to learn about challenging topics like conflict transformation for example, and how educators can develop new and innovative board games that are also fun to play.

Board games are making a big comeback, the industry is creating more complex and challenging games as well as cooperative fun games that can make young people get together around the table. We also discussed the roles that board games and digital games have and how some games in our days use both platforms to create amazing experiences.

Hope you enjoy it as much as we did, gather up your friends or your kids and let's play some board games!

Coaching in Youth Work with Tomáš Pešek, episode 9

This episode was recorded during a Future Labs partners meeting in the beautiful Tuscany in Italy.

While we were recording, during a break, some of the partners were enjoying the good weather, but we don't know who had the most fun, because we sure enjoyed very much this talk.

Tomáš Pešek is a youth trainer and also a certified coach, and we discussed some of the ways that he uses coaching with young people, both on a one-to-one and in a group setting.

He also trains youth workers on how to use these coaching techniques: when to use them, but also when not, and just listen.

Tomáš also talked about rites of passage, in a project he is involved with young men in the transition to adulthood. All inspiring stuff! (Definitely better than just good weather 😉)

Tomáš website: www.improve-se.sk

About coaching: www.coachfederation.org

About youthwork and NFE that Tomáš does: www.youthwatch.sk

 

Vulnerability with Dani Korai, episode 8

"In this episode we talked to Dani Korai about the topic of Vulnerability, a sensitive and a strong topic, at the same time. Dani is a Dutch youth worker and trainer that believes in the power of Vulnerability to connect with young people. According to him, it helps them to open up and share their struggles, step by step, in what needs to be a mindful process. A safe space is needed for using vulnerability in a positive and constructive way; it needs preparation and the building of trust between people.

Contrary to some beliefs, Vulnerability is an act of courage, and after opening up most people feel more empowered, because they don't feel the need to hide for something that used to make them fell flawed in some way. It was a very nice conversation, where Dani shared as well his own story and how his relationship with this topic started.

Here are some of the resources shared:

Brené Brown TED talk

Core quality quadrant Daniel Ofman.

LARP, Live Action Role Playing Games with Patrycja Paula Gas, episode 7

In this episode we talked to Patrycja Paula Gas, a witch as she confessed to us, but a different kind of witch, the kind that is doing LARP - Live Action Role Playing game - a new aproach  into a learning evironment, an immersive experience that will definetly engage the participants minds, bodies and souls.

Patrycja who is a polish anthropologist, uses LARP with young people to tackle a wide array of topics such as discrimination, migrations and leadership skills. 

In LARP, the participants live fully this game for days, with costumes, just like a big theatre in nature.

Educational LARPs have an immense power for young people experience other ways of dealing with the world, as for example a shy person might play a bold character and see that they can face their real lives in a more confident way.

Websites mentioned in the podcast.

Drachenfest

EduLarp

Educational Escape Rooms with Gabi Steinprinz, episode 6

Episode 6 of the Talking Youth Work podcast is with Gabi Steinprinz about Educational Escape Rooms.

Gabi is - in her own words - a game addict, and also a creative person, so in a project also funded by Erasmus+ she decided to experiment joining the gaming part of escape rooms with the learning/educational part.

The results were very interesting, with a high engagement of the learners, interesting challenges, the focus on the learning and especially the fun part.

Educational escape rooms can be used to help young people deal with all kind of social issues, as for example gender discrimination.

It was a nice conversation that showed us a very innovative way on how learning can be an immersive experience.

Link for the Educational Tools Portal, here.

 

Trends in young people with Ellen Anthoni, episode 5

This is truly a handful, it is our fifth episode, and our guest this time is Ellen Anthoni, who's a trendwatcher.

Ellen has worked in recent years for Trendwolves, working on their trend reports.

We had another interviewer with us, Tomáš Pešek, that was a big help with very insightful questions.

During our conversation with Ellen we tried to understand what is trendwatching, and how it is important to all of us, but in this case, youthworkers.

Some of the trends that we talked about were:

• Blurred lives
• Super sculpted selves
• Crazy health trends

Blurred lives is a very important one, because youngsters don't want to limit themselves to one thing, and without a clear definition of who they are, normal interactions need to be re-thinked.

These are big concepts that Ellen helped us understand, and she also gave nice tips so we can become trendwatchers ourselves.

Ellen's website.

Trendwolves website.

 

Game based learning with Stephan Schölzel, episode 4

This episode is with Stephan Schölzel, a youth worker that uses games as a vehicle to talk about other subjects with young people, and by using games we can learn about what are their concerns but also their interests. 

A lot of times people criticize video games because of the absent mindedness it may cause in our children, but, if we can see the potential of engagement that video games have, we can tap into something that we better connects us with young people, and by using games we can improve social skills related to empathy, resilience and much more.

Stephan brings a lot of good insights about how to use games, and examples of real life situations where games were used to tackle questions like gender, for example.

The website with resources that is mentioned in the podcast is in german, but google translation can help the non-german speakers.

Digitale Spielewelten 

Improvisation Theatre with Gergely Kiss, episode 3

Here is a fresh episode of “Talking Youth”, a podcast about innovation in youth work. This time we talked with Gergely Kiss about using Improvisation Theatre with young people and the skills they develop while practicing it. Ready? 3,2,1....scene!

 

The book mentioned by Gery , "Impro for Storytellers" by Keith Johnstone

Digital Innovation with Nerijus Kriauciunas, episode 2

In this episode we talked  with Nerijus Kriauciunas, an international trainer in the field of youth. Nerijus is really a reference when it comes to connecting the digital world to youth work on the field. We started talking about his personal journey  into youth work and how that shaped what he does today. in the beginning Nerijus connects references like Paulo Freire on Education and critical thinking with Mcluhan on Media literacy, which I find really interesting. Than we discussed a bit how he sees innovation in the field of youth and we identified possible barriers that might be stopping youth workers to become more innovative. Finally Nerijus left some really precious tips on digital tools that you might want to consider if you work directly with young people. It was a real pleasure to have him on the show. So get ready… let's talk youth work.

Resources talked in this episode:

• Badge Craft
• ActionBound
• Klikaklu
• Meistertask

 

Presentation of the Project, Talking with the partners, episode 1

In the first episode the partners are discussing on the project goal and the importance for developing digital youth work.