Derek E. Baird is a leading kid culture expert, futurist, and author who helps brands, educators, and parents safely connect with kids and teens through culture, media, and technology.
I've recently partnered with my colleague and friend, B.J. Fogg, author of the New York Times Bestseller, Tiny Habits, to build a community to help teach parents, teachers, and other trusted adults to use the Tiny Habits methods to improve the lives of children.
If you're interested in joining Tiny Habits for Kids, please use this priority invitation. In order to keep our Tiny Habits for Kids community robust, useful, and free of trolls, we ask you to verify your identity when you complete your invitation.
"Tiny Habits is a blueprint for redefining our approach to self-improvement. The habits are tiny, but the results are big." -Arianna Huffington, Founder and CEO at Thrive Global
Just like the original version of the book, the Chinese language edition offers a comprehensive guide for any youth brand or organization trying to reach Gen Z.
"Many books talk about Gen Z, but this is a definitive playbook for modern marketers and business people to authentically engage an emerging generation."
-Stefan Heinrich, Head of Global Marketing, ByteDance (TikTok)
The book covers content creation, connecting with youth culture, online community and content engagement strategies, and tactics such as social media, experiential, emerging technologies (like AR and VR), kids' privacy law, building online communities, embracing youth culture, and much more.
While children are living more of their lives online, little is known about what they understand about the implications of their online participation.
In this report, the Tiana Murray & Rachel Buchanan report on the Best Footprint Forward project conducted at the University of Newcastle (UON), which explored how children come to understand the internet.
Thirty-three children (ranging in age from 10 to 12 years old) from three primary schools in regional Australia participated in focus groups and created a work sample depicting the internet.
Analysis of the focus group transcripts and work samples revealed that while the children’s understanding of the internet was not technical, their knowledge was developed through the social activities that they engaged in online, and influenced by the interactions they have in their ‘real life’ with parents, teachers, and friends.
The children in the study demonstrated ambivalence about the internet; they regularly went online for a variety of purposes but these positive experiences were tempered by concerns and fears. This research presents a nuanced perspective of children’s knowledge of the internet; by rejecting the notion that children are naïve, passive consumers of digital culture, analysis of their understanding reveals it to be balanced and sophisticated.
At 11 years old Jahkil Jackson is the CEO of Trophies, a streetwear brand that champions positivity and education, and the Executive Director of 'Project IAM,' a philanthropic endeavor that raises awareness and support for the homeless.
While there’s much hype around the use of VR in education, how are teachers using this emerging technology in the classroom? What do students think? Those are just some of the questions Foundry 10 asked teachers and students in their VR in Education Pilot Program.
Gen Z Book Pick 📕
Full of heart and celebrating the things that make us different, ‘Song for a Whale’ by Lynne Kelly shows how, with a little determination, kids can make big waves and change the world.
Here's my latest piece for Virtual Reality Pop magazine! From Disney Studios + Pixar VR entertainment experiences to Google Cardboard and Oculus VR in school, Gen Z's reality now comes in virtual and augmented.
Given that all the big tech giants (Apple, Google, and Facebook) have already baked augmented reality capabilities into their smartphones or apps, the rate at which this always-connected Gen Z has adopted these technologies shouldn’t be surprising.
Today my book ‘The GenZ Frequency’, co-written with Gregg L. Witt, was officially published in the UK and the rest of the world by Kogan Page! The book will be published in the US on September 28th!
If I’ve learned anything during the process of writing this book, it’s that Gen Z is going to change the world. Thank you to all the young people who were willing to talk to me during the writing of this book and helping me to tune into the Gen Z frequency.
'The Gen Z Frequency' offers a comprehensive youth marketing guide for any brand or organization trying to reach this demographic, covering fundamental truths, content creation, connecting with youth culture, engagement strategies and tactics such as social media, experiential, emerging technologies (like AR and VR), kids privacy law, building online communities, edtech and much more.
Results of new research conducted in August 2018 by The Harris Poll for Pearson Education.
The report explores the education, learning and media consumption habits and preferences of Generation Z.
One surprising finding in this report is that Gen Z students still like to have teachers give them printed handouts and paper-based learning resources. So while they're mobile natives, looks like they still enjoy being analog.
This is an interesting and worthwhile report for anyone who works in education technology and is looking to create learning experiences that resonate with Gen Z.
The Regeneron Science Talent Search is the nation’s oldest and most prestigious science, technology, engineering, and mathematics competition for 12th-grade students in the country.
The Science Talent Search has been identifying and celebrating the best and brightest young scientific minds in the United States since 1942. The competition receives more than 1,800 applications each year from high school seniors across the country.
The Society for Science and the Public awards $3.1million annually to deserving high school students, and they want as many students, from all states and all walks of life, know about this opportunity as possible. The competition is completely free for students, and is a great indicator of top STEM talent—thirteen Nobel prize winners participated in this program as high school students.
The Regeneron Science Talent Search 2019 application is now open! High school seniors across the United States are invited to share their original research projects and apply to the nation’s oldest and most prestigious STEM competition, where they could win up to $250,000.
The top 300 scholars receive $2,000 each, and their schools also receive $2,000—that’s funding for STEM education in your community. Forty finalists will be invited to compete in the finals week competition in Washington, DC, all expenses paid. Every finalist receives at least $25,000 and if named in the top 10, could win between $40,000 and $250,000.
Check out last year’s highlights video, learn more about the top 40 finalists’ research projects in this video from the Public Exhibition of Projects, watch the winner’s results and remarks from Malcolm Gladwell in this video from our awards gala to learn more.
The application will close on Wednesday, November 14, 2018, at 8pm ET, but interested students are encouraged to open applications early in order to receive tips and reminders. There is no limit to the number of students who can enter any school, region or state, and students may submit research from any year of high school.
Many parents are under the impression that it's just Google or social networking companies that are tracking and collecting data on their kids.
However, it's not just social and gaming apps who are collecting data on your kids. There are many unseen players in the kids' media ecosystem--ranging from edtechcompanies to connected toys and digital assistants (hello, Alexa) and educational marketing companies, who are harvesting data on children and teens.
And while the new GDPR-K regulations (and the forthcoming CCPA) are a step in the right direction, in the U.S. it's time for our COPPA laws to be extended to protect the privacy of all minors.
Dr. Sonia Livingstone, a professor at London School of Economics, has authored a new study, "Children: A Special Case for Privacy" for the International Institute of Communications, that takes a deep dive into kids privacy.
"Children’s voices are particularly absent, being rarely consulted or included in national or international deliberations. -Dr. Sonia Livingstone"
As this study points out, it's likely that the technology industry will get better at protecting the data of all its users, but their needs to be a conversation about the bigger issue of the "datafication" of our lives---especially when it comes to kids and teens---how or if their personal data should be used for commercial benefit.
As the number one social network for Gen Z teens, Instagram has been increasingly proactive in developing both technology and wellbeing programs that improve the lives of the teens. In addition, the new comment filter is focusing on protecting teen celebrities and influencers who are often the recipients of brutal attacks in the comment section on their social feeds.
We first got a sneak peek at this new filtering technology last summer when Instagram co-founder and CEO Kevin Systrom sat down with CBS News to talk about how the social network is betting that limiting hate speech will encourage more expression on the platform.
"Is it free speech just to be mean to someone?" - Kevin Systrom, CEO Instagram
According to Instagram, "This new filter hides comments containing attacks on a person's appearance or character, as well as threats to a person's well-being or health. The bullying filter is on for our global community and can be disabled in the Comment Controls center in the app.”
Based on an evidence-focused literature review, the first part of this paper examines existing knowledge on how the time children spend using digital technology impacts their well-being across three dimensions; mental/psychological, social and physical. The evidence reviewed here is largely inconclusive with respect to impact on children’s physical activity but indicates that digital technology seems to be beneficial for children’s social relationships.
In terms of impact on children’s mental well-being, the most robust studies suggest that the relationship is U-shaped, where no use and excessive use can have a small negative impact on mental well-being, while moderate use can have a small positive impact.
"Claims that the brain might be hijacked or re-wired by digital technology are not supported by neuroscience evidence and should be treated with skepticism."
In the second part of the paper, the hypothetical idea of addiction to technology is introduced and scrutinized. This is followed by an overview of the hypothetical idea that digital technology might re-wire or hijack children’s brains; an assumption that is challenged by recent neuroscience evidence. In conclusion, considerable methodological limitations exist across the spectrum of research on the impact of digital technology on child well-being, including the majority of the studies on time use reviewed here, and those studies concerned with clinical or brain impacts. This prompts reconsideration of how research in this area is conducted. Finally, recommendations for strengthening research practices are offered.
VR, especially when combined with storytelling, enable the student to participate in the story, develop empathy to experiences outside their current realm of understanding and fully immersed in their learning.
While there’s much hype around the use of VR in education, how are teachers using this emerging technology in the classroom? What do students think? Those are just some of the questions asked by research conducted by Foundry 10, a Seattle-based non-profit.
Foundry 10: Students & VR Pilot Program
In 2015, 2015, Foundry 10 launched a pilot project to study the impact and student sentiment towards the use of virtual reality in their classroom and curriculum. Foundry 10 reached out to educators who expressed an interest in utilizing VR in their classes and provided them with headsets.
Last summer, millions of kids discovered the power of Augmented Reality (AR) while using apps like PokemonGo, Snapchat and Instagram.
In light of these socio-cultural changes, educators need to “keep abreast of change” and embrace curriculum design which integrates the authentic ways that students use AR in their “out of school” experiences as a tool that connects them with peers and content as a means to achieve, both short and long term, learning goals.
Like other technologies, AR has the potential to be a powerful tool that support the personalized learning goals of students by bringing scannable content to life in an engaging and cost effective manner.
For a generation that’s been raised on interactive technologies, bringing AR into the classroom and curriculum can also help encourage active engagement and contribute to student retention.
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