Usefulness of Social Network Sites for Adolescents' Development of Online Career Skills

Schools have an important role in teaching students how to use Social Network Site (SNS) for career purposes. This involves the opportunity for students to practice online career skills. Different types of digital environments are available for schools. There are SNS designed to enable users to interact and network. In addition there are digital environments - like Virtual Learning Environments (VLE's) - designed to support learning processes but with possibilities to network and interact as well. Little is known about how characteristics of these environments may support the development of online career skills. In this study the suitability of four digital environments - two SNS and two VLE's- to practice online career skills was investigated. The concept of affordances was used to relate the characteristics of the digital environments to how they may stimulate the practice of online career skills. Based on this concept a framework was developed to analyse the characteristics of each environment. In addition, these results were compared with the actual use of the SNS by students. The results show that, although the two SNS appear to offer a stronger environment for practicing online career skills, students do not show more online career behaviour in these environments. Implications are discussed

The evidence base for careers websites. What works?

There is some evidence which suggests that using career websites as part of broader careers education provision can impact positively on young people’s career readiness and the quality and diversity of their social networks for careers purposes. The evidence points to a number of findings which can be turned into lessons for practice. - Information-based career websites need to exist in the context of a wider offline careers support program. They are not a replacement for professional career guidance. - Career websites that provide automated interactions need to be embedded within a wider range of careers support services. Only by doing so can they increase users’ awareness of career support or give users new ideas about careers by exposing them to multimedia resources. - Where career websites are used to facilitate communication (e.g. through online guidance and counselling or through delivery based inside virtual worlds), this can lead to positive outcomes such as gains in career decidedness and self-knowledge, gains in satisfaction with future career prospects, and in career exploration behaviours (such as more frequent career searches). - Career websites need to be integrated into careers education provision and into wider forms of career support (e.g. tutorial support and personal guidance).Careers and Enterprise Compan

Independent Evaluation of the Jim Joseph Foundation's Education Initiative Year 4 Report

Research indicates that well-prepared educators help produce strong learning outcomes for students. For the continued health of Jewish education, higher education institutions should have the capacity to prepare sufficient numbers of highly qualified educators and education leaders for careers in Jewish education. Teachers, division heads, and school heads represent a substantial segment of the educator population in Jewish day schools. More than 5,000 educators enter new positions in Jewish day schools every year and are in need of adequate preparation. The most frequent obstacle to instructional quality in Jewish day schools is the difficulty in recruiting qualified teachers (Ben-Avie & Kress, 2006; Jewish Education Service of North America, 2008; Kidron et al., in press; Krakowski, 2011; Sales, 2007).A similar problem has been observed in supplementary schools in congregational or communal settings. These schools enroll the majority of Jewish children and adolescents receiving a Jewish education in the United States (Wertheimer, 2008). In recent years, congregations have begun to replace traditional educational programs with new approaches that aim to raise the quality of instruction and the level of parent and student satisfaction relative to their programs. These new approaches may include greater integration of experiential Jewish education and community service, family learning, and the integration of all aspects of congregational learning under the leadership of one director (Rechtschaffen, 2011; Sales, Samuel, Koren, & Shain, 2010). High-quality programs that are updated or reconstructed across time to meet the needs of the Jewish community require well-prepared directors and educators. However, many directors and educators in congregational schools have not participated in teacher preparation programs, and the depth of Jewish content knowledge among these teachers is highly variable (Stodolsky, Dorph, & Rosov, 2008)

Interneti võimalused ja ohud: noorte online-praktikate mõju nende subjektiivsele heaolule

Väitekirja elektrooniline versioon ei sisalda publikatsioone.Teismelised on ühed kõige aktiivsemad internetikasutajad ja internet moodustab loomuliku osa nende igapäevaelust. Kuna internet on siiski suhteliselt uus meedium, mille kasutust ei raamista väga kindlad normid, kuid mille noored on väga kiirelt ja aktiivselt omaks võtnud, ärgitab see küsima, millist mõju internetikasutus noortele avaldab – kas positiivset või negatiivset. Heaolu kontseptsioonist lähtudes on doktoritöös vaatluse all nii internetikasutuse positiivsed kui ka negatiivsed küljed ning nende mõju noorte elukvaliteedile. Viimane aspekt on eriti oluline, kuna teismeiga on üks olulisemaid arenguperioode. Doktoritöös olid vaatluse all noorte online-praktikad – ühelt poolt blogimine kui positiivne ja teiselt poolt ülemäärane internetikasutus kui problemaatiline praktika – ning see, kuidas ja missugustel tingimustel need suurendavad või vähendavad noore heaolu. Nii meediumi valikut kui kasutust kujundavad laiemad kontekstuaalsed tegurid nagu vanus, sugu ja sotsiaalne keskkond (näiteks suhted pere ja eakaaslastega) ning ühiskondlikud tingimused (kultuuriline tasand), milles inimene elab, aga ka meediumi enda või selle rakenduste omadused. Seega võib järeldada, et just kontekst loob ja määrab internetikasutuse võimalikud positiivsed või negatiivsed tulemid. Internetikasutusel võivad olla erinevad tagajärjed. Näiteks avaldavad noored blogides enamasti tõele vastavat sisu, millega nad kujundavad enda identiteeti ja hoiavad sotsiaalseid suhteid, või mis pakub võimalust pälvida tunnustust eakaaslaste hulgas. Samas jagavad noored blogis enda kohta intiimset infot, millel võivad olla negatiivsed tagajärjed. Ülemäärane internetikasutus on seotud nii psühholoogiliste probleemide, internetis veedetava aja kui ka noore digitaalsete oskustega ja sellega, mida ta online-keskkonnas teeb. Ülemäärane internetikasutus võib olla ühelt poolt toimetulekustrateegia, saamaks üle negatiivsetest emotsioonidest, kuna just noortele ekspertkasutajatele pakub internet mitmesuguseid võimalusi meelelahutuseks ja tujutõstmiseks. Teiselt poolt võib see toimetulekumehhanism avaldada pikemas perspektiivis noore heaolule negatiivset mõju.Teenagers have become the most prominent users of the Internet as they effortlessly incorporate the medium into their everyday lives. Due to the newness of the medium, only partially settled norms surrounding usage, and intensity with which the online space was adopted by the youth, much attention has been paid to dwell upon whether the usage of the Internet by the young people brings along positive or negative outcomes. The concept of well-being is used in the thesis to simultaneously look both at the positive and negative aspects of Internet use and to ask how these phenomena are related to young people’s quality of life. The latter question is especially important as adolescence is the formative period in young people’s development. The thesis looked at online practices – blogging as a positive side, and excessive Internet use as a problematic one – and how and in what condition they increase or decrease the well-being of the young. The findings suggest that both media choice and usage, as well as the well-being of the young Internet users, are framed by larger contextual factors – age and gender of the user; social environment (e.g. family and peer influence) and societal (cultural level) conditions individuals live in; and the structural characteristics of the medium or its applications. Hence, the thesis suggests that it is the context which creates and defines the positivity and negativity of certain outcomes of Internet usage. For instance, adolescent bloggers primarily stay truthful to their offline selves in their blogs, and hence the practice could be seen as a mechanism for maintaining one’s identity and social contacts, but also as an opportunity to seek prestige and competence among the peer group. At the same time, revealing intimate details about one’s life in a blog can also lead to possible negative consequences. Excessive Internet use among the young is related to psychological distress and the time spent online but also to one’s digital skills and the activities one engages in online. Hence, on the one hand, excessive Internet use may be a coping strategy, especially for more expert young users of the medium, as it offers a wide range of opportunities for mood management and entertainment; on the other hand, it may have negative outcomes on one’s well-being in the long run

Use of Social Networking Sites in Academics: A Review

In the current era with the advent horizon of technology and its usage, encouraged the use of social networking sites among the society. In the last decade, it made an imperative impact and rapid change on the working on almost all organizations and professions be it businesses, industries, or academia. In the academic organizations, the use of social networking sites by students and youths for academic and non-academic communication is increasing rapidly in India and Oman. Social networking sites is itself provide massive communication channels and service that can support and yield in getting solutions to many administrative issues for academic institutions. However, Universities and institutions have not formally accepted in India. This paper reviews surveys and experiments by academic researchers in various parts of the world. To evident, the usefulness and significance of SNS in academic world several studied and experiments have been elaborated in this paper. During this study top fifteen universities in the world have been taken into consideration. The comparative study has been carried out among them with reference to use of social networking sites and their relative factors. We found that almost all universities are very much aware and have significant place in their system.  The result brings the fact that use of social networking sites in academic institutions will bring the significant change in the operations and task handling, hence proposed

How do young people (in the region) form their views on future learning and career options?

The research informed the activities of the Regional Employment and Skills Partnership, and more specifically to “inform the future development of labour market intelligence (LMI) to support the provision of employment related information advice and guidance (IAG) to support young people”. This report provides the 14 – 19 Commission with a literature review which: • highlights the core principles of young people’s decision-making processes; • takes into consideration research which discusses the cognitive changes that young people undergo between the ages of 14 -19; • focuses on structural issues, which affect young peoples views on future work and learning options; • Investigates the significance of place and locale in the formation of young people’s views and decision making in a manner that is mindful of the identity of the North East region

Civic Identities, Online Technologies: From Designing Civics Curriculum to Supporting Civic Experiences

Part of the Volume on Civic Life Online: Learning How Digital Media Can Engage Youth.Youth today are often criticized for their lack of civic participation and involvement in political life. Technology has been blamed, amongst many other causes, for fostering social isolation and youth's retreat into a private world disconnected from their communities. However, current research is beginning to indicate that these might be inaccurate perceptions. The Internet has provided new opportunities to create communities that extend beyond geographic boundaries, to engage in civic and volunteering activities across local and national frontiers, to learn about political life, and to experience the challenges of democratic participation. How do we leverage youth's interest in new technologies by developing technology-based educational programs to promote civic engagement? This chapter explores this question by proposing socio-technical design elements to be considered when developing technology-rich experiences. It presents a typology to guide the design of Internet-based interventions, taking into account both the affordances of the technology and the educational approach to the use of the technology. It also presents a pilot experience in a northeastern university that offered a pre-orientation program in which incoming freshman designed a three-dimensional virtual campus of the future and developed new policies and programs to strengthen the relationship between college campus and neighbor communities

Psychosocial Stages of Symbolic Action in Social Media

Social media provides new capabilities for engaging in symbolic action through digital content and network structure. Most social media research assumes that people engage in similar symbolic actions regardless of their developmental maturity. Developmental psychology, however, argues that people are capable of different symbolic engagement and exhibit predictable social needs during different stages of life, suggesting that they may use social media in very different ways at different stages. This research note explores the implications of Erikson’s psychosocial theory on symbolic action using social media, and concludes that people are likely to use social media in fundamentally different ways, depending on their stage of psychosocial development. These conclusions have numerous implications for social media theory, research methodology, and practice

Parental Caregiver Guide For An Adolescent With Down Syndrome: Transitioning Out Of High School

Purpose: The current literature revealed a need to address the establishment, organization, and application of primary health care as well as support programs for parental caregivers of adolescents with Down syndrome, especially during the transition period out of high school (Barros, Barros, Barros, & Santos, 2017). Providing information, resources, and support to parental caregivers of adolescents with Down syndrome and health care professionals, such as occupational therapists, can help alleviate caregiver burden and promote the parents’ quality of life. Occupational therapists can play an important role during the post-secondary transition period for adolescents with Down syndrome by assisting them in developing adaptive behaviors, increasing self-advocacy and self-determination, gaining employment skills, and life skills (Berg, Jirikowic, Haerling, & MacDonald, 2017); however, they can also address the needs of the parental caregivers, especially self-care needs, to assist them through this process and ease caregiver burden