Category: Student Ministry

I don’t know if this is creative, or a late night without creative ideas. Anyhow, Andy, don’t get any ideas!!!!

I grew up on this stuff and I am pretty normal, but that was back in the day. I wonder what they say about the UFC?

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Teenage fans of TV wrestling are more likely than their peers to be aggressive or take chances with their health, a study suggests.

Researchers found that among 2,300 16- to 20-year-old Americans, those who watched professional wrestling were more likely to be violent, smoke or have unprotected sex — and the more they watched TV wrestling, the greater their odds of taking such risks.

However, he told Reuters Health, it is “definitely possible” that TV wrestling affects teenagers’ behavior. In an earlier study, Wolfson and his colleagues found that teenage girls who watched wrestling were more likely to get into fights or carry a weapon at a later point in adolescence.

In general, researchers believe that children can become desensitized by violence in movies, TV and video games — particularly when those portrayals downplay the consequences of violence. A steady dose of media violence may also influence young people’s perceptions, priming them to take other people’s words and actions as hostile and to react aggressively.

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Well, I wish I was there . . . but I am still in Texas! Many of my friends are and it would be so fun to hang out with them, so they better take good notes!!

Going to Student MInistry Conferences are so fun and refreshing. Its fun to get away and refreshing to learn that I am not alone when it comes to my ministry journey. REALLY, only other youth workers can relate to the stories, good and bad, passion to see God do something big in and thru the life of a teenager, as well as understand the hurt, lonelyness, excitement, joy and all the other emotions we experience from day to day, (more like minute to minute). I am sure it will be exciting and I am looking forward to hearing stories of what is going on!!

Click here to see people blogging about the event!

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – When it comes to alcohol, many teenagers may take a cue from their parents, new research suggests.

In a study of more than 4,700 teenagers, researchers found that parents’ drinking habits appeared to influence their children in both direct and indirect ways.

In the first case, teenagers seemed to simply follow the example of a parent who drank excessively, the study found. In the second case, many teens seemed to view parents’ drinking as a sign of lax parenting, and this, in turn, affected their likelihood of drinking.

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Uh-oh. Social networking was supposed to be the Next Big Thing on the Internet. MySpace, Facebook, and other sites have been attracting millions of new users, building sprawling sites that companies are banking on to trigger an online advertising boom. Trouble is, the boom isn’t booming anymore. Like Heritage, many people are spending less time on social networking sites or signing off altogether.

The MySpace generation may be getting annoyed with ads and a bit bored with profile pages. The average amount of time each user spends on social networking sites has fallen by 14% over the last four months, according to market researcher ComScore. MySpace, the largest social network, has slipped from a peak of 72 million users in October to 68.9 million in December, ComScore says. The total number of people on such sites is still increasing at an 11.5% rate, but that’s down sharply from past growth rates. “What you have with social networks is the most overhyped scenario in online advertising,” says Tim Vanderhook, CEO of Specific Media, which places ads for customers on a variety of Web sites.

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This weekend we are taking High School Students to a conference! Should be a great time of learning and developing relationships. Pray for us and I will be back blogging on Monday. Have a great Weekend!

There’s more at this link!

The title of this article presupposes two things: first, your teens are being exposed to pornography, and second, you are already responding—even if you are doing nothing. Maybe you are tempted to toss this article aside with a shrug, “Well, my kids haven’t been exposed and I am careful to protect them. I don’t need to read this.” But, watch an hour of prime-time television and you have seen pornography. Drive past any number of billboards while on a trip and you have seen pornography. Look at the fashion posters in the clothing stores at the mall and you have seen it—in some form.

Part of our problem is that we have either no clear definition, or a very limited definition, of pornography. Most of us think of it as something you find in some rundown bookstore, or maybe in a convenience store. Most of us realize the Internet has a reputation of being filled with it. But do we realize we are surrounded by it, like a hapless adventurer sinking in quicksand?

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Today we started a 6 week series on Sex!! Worship was great! Our Student Band has really taken our worship to another level. I think that MS actually went better than HS. I know I was worried more about sharing this topIc with them than HS. Here is the intro video we used to transition and set up the talk!