I got up nice and early this morning to catch my train to London for Youthworkmag Summit 2012. I'm currently sitting on the train looking at the programme and it's an exciting day ahead.

I'll try to post as many updates on this thread as I can, so keep checking back...

Mark Ostereicher now on stage setting the tone for the day

..telling us not to feel overwhelmed, guilty, incapable by what we hear today. We shouldn't leave feeling that we're not good enough.

..tells us that we don't need a big fundraising campaign or loads of equipment to get going. YOU are the main tool. You do not need to be somebody other than who you are. You are the one who god has called and placed in your community with YP. All you need is Christ in you and a love of teenagers.

Session 1 now starts. 'ENGAGE'

Nicola Morgan first up, talking about teenage brains...

Nicola Morgan...

Teenage behaviour is not a new phenomenon. Shakespeare even expressed a wish that there were no age between 10-23!! That's how long he saw adolescence as.

N.B. her book is 'blame my brain'

The untidy teenage bedroom goes a long way toward explaining a few other things...

Like life, a lot has to happen in that one room: sleep, study, work, socialise etc.

It's the only place the teenager has of her own. The only place where she has control. So when somebody comes in it can be threatening.

Teenagers have stronger emotions than the rest of us and less ability to control them. They also have more difficulty recognising the emotions they see in others.

The most common mistake for teens is to wrongly interpret somebody else's emotions as anger. They will be more likely, too, to overreact.

Interesting stuff so far

Helen continues...

Respect from peers is more important to teens than respect from parents. Presumably teachers, youth workers too.

They also attach more weight to present pleasure than to future consequences.

This explains a greater chance of risk taking.

Hence, tidying a bedroom at parents request is not always easy!!

Every item dropped in a bedroom represents a decision to value present satisfaction over future consequences.

This also represents rebellion, which is another big teenage need.

N.B. this is iPad live blogging - be warned, there WILL be typos!!!!!

Maybe, instead of being antagonistic about untidy bedrooms, we should marvel that anything gets done at all!!

BRILLIANT first talk

Simon Parnell now giving us the third talk all about how TV is going to change in the coming years. 

In the 1970s, people spent 5-10% of the value of their houses on their TVs. Amazing.

OLED is a new technology enabling us to have glass surfaces which can project huge TV images on them.

This will give us the ability to change the size of content and to have a few different things up at once.

The resolution and sharpness of pictures is also going up and up and up.

We now have 1080 lines on our TV sets.  In the future everything will be crystal clear and sharp.

You can now buy cameras which are ready for this huge resolution.

Good talk so far. Interesting stuff. Needs a youth ministry link now though!!

In the future TV will bring together broadcast, broadband and content from your own home. E.g. Movie, then child's bedroom if baby is crying etc. this media will live with us through our days rather than something which being something to turn on occasionally. Maybe like iPhones, I guess.

In the next 5 years this will happen.

The guy next to me is worried about the potential this has to degrade human relationships and stop us actually talking to one another. Good point.

Screens we can tough and control are just around the corner too - like the cool wall in NCIS LA (my thought, not his!)

TV has a huge role in storytelling and bringing people together, which has always been fundamental to the human race

He ends with a question, which is basically are we going to get involved in this to shape it for young people?

Not a great talk, but very interesting. Not bad by an means.

Ruth Corden currenty talking about sex education. Talking a break from live blogging for a while now to do a few other things...

@VicarWill tells us that we can't be effective youth workers in this day and age without an understanding of mental health issues.

Anxiety and Depression has increased 70% in British teens in the last 25 years.

This isn't matched by US trends meaning that it is a UK problem.

The answer to mental health problems isn't to pray harder and try harder. We need to access the services available. Jesus works through them.

His website, by the way www.mindandsoul.info

Kate John is now talking about evangelisation.

Youth events used to be a band and then a short talk at the end about penal substitution.

We all know there is so much more to the gospel than can be put across in ten minutes.

Evangelisation needs to see the bigger picture.

We need to talk about who Jesus is and about what he thinks about things.

This is an excellent talk. Best so far, I think.

So many YP are either skeptical hangers-on or people with a lot of enthusiasm but not a lot of theology.

Our message must be wider than just 'Jesus took the punishment for our sins'

Evangelism works best these days in small chunks. Maybe 5 mins each.

Getting YP to txt in while you are speaking can work well. It's a good tool for doing a talk.

Great talk from @kateyfc

Next talk is from a real live teenager. Janusz is going to talk about being in the care system. This should be really investing...

This lad has had a tough life. Home life collapsed and he was taken into care.

He felt alone in care. He didn't know much English and felt like an outcast initially.

Super groups helped him to know that he wasnt alone.

He is affirming the work of youth workers who work with young people at risk and he is thanking us.

'Keep making a diffence - it's working!'

Next talk from Rebecca Hamer who will be talking about the space project in Harrow...

Her talk is called 'you've got nothing to say'

The thrust if this talk is about how well we listen to young people. Their story isn't the same as ours so we need to listen. We shouldn't try to direct the conversation to where we want it to go, but be guided by them.

A totally passive way of counselling young people though can disappoint them initially. Over a period of time though, this sort of counselling can lead YP to hear themselves or the first time.

A good talk about the value of non-directive counselling.

Giving young people the space to figure things out for themselves can be a great help to them

Not much to write down here, but a fantastic talk. Good stuff.

She finishes by talking about www.acornchristian.org a place where she got some good training.

Another live blogging break.

It's a tough pace to keep up!!

A good lunch time... I had a good burger (with bacon), had a chat with James Corden's sister, caught up with a few old friends and made some new ones too.

It's always nice when people come up and say hi because they know the site or they know me on twitter. It's been great to connect with so many people. I'm very impressed that we even seem to be known (well, a bit) in the evangelical world too...

Claire Farley now talking about schools work.

She is talking very much about non-Catholic schools so this talk may not be so relevant to Catholics in a direct sense, but interesting nevertheless.

Points:

-'School Pastors' is an initiative from the ascension trust. Currently running across south London and a few places around the country. Made up of volunteers from the local churches, given 6 training sessions.

It is detached youth work done after school hours.

-She works for Linx Christian School Trust.

I'm finding this talk a little basic - perhaps because this is one of the very few areas where the Catholic Church is well ahead of the game. Maybe?

Don't get me wrong though - it's a good talk about what can be done in schools. She is currently talking about how schools workers can give local youth workers and ministers a bigger profile in the school - events, invitations lunches. Good stuff.

Good talk.


THE DAY SO FAR

Amazing so far. Only one talk hasn't really hit the spot so far. All have been at least good and some absolutely amazing. Patrick Regan and Kate John have been the best so far.


Next talk is about the issue of pornography among young people...

Avail Baigent now on... Doing well.

Points:

-Repetitive prayer can hold us in Gods love. April tells the story of a young person bullied and finding solace in prayer beeds.

-we spend time chasing after the latest fad, but we forget that we represent a 2000 year tradition that has held Catholics together well for years.

Avrils talk is About how ancient disciplines can bring depth to discipleship. She uses prayer beads as an example as they occupy the sense of touch as well as the chatty and contemplative parts of us.

Avail is now mentioning the Rosary and JPII - GO Avril!!!!!!!!!!

There was a tiny bit of murmuring when she mentioned the Rosary, but genially, she's got people listening!!

Workshops where YP make rosary beeds can also work well.

Les Comee now talking about self care...

Saying that God taught him a lot when he was tired out and exhausted.

We need to look after each other and ourselves, I guess is the point...

Having a meal together is a great support group!

Looking after each other makes the move from being a mission to being a mission community. Great point. Community comes first, then mission comes out of that.

Listening day after day to the hurt and pain is what tires you out more than anything else.

Silence is always good too. Hard, but good.

The whole audience will now spend 3 mins in silence.