Digital ‘detox’ mends friendships
A negative social media environment lead to the falling out between friends, but when the online world began encroaching on the playground, one school decided to do something about it.
The prevalence of technology meant students communicating online was inevitable, resource teacher Laura van Leeuwen said, but who was helping them to navigate it?
She was called to Netherton School in rural Hauraki, where a group of eight friends admitted to losing sleep over fights breaking out on social media.
After face-to-face discussions, a friendship circle, and a week-long ‘‘digital detox’’, the group found calm within what is oftentimes a social media storm.
‘‘Online, it’s self-navigating. Offline, we’ve got structures and tikanga we follow, but online is so much different,’’ van Leeuwen said.
Her digital wellness intervention was supported by teacher Vennessa Silvester and Netherton School principal Brook Hill.
They met with the students to discuss how their online communications at home were influencing their offline friendships in school.
The staff found the girls would often stay up late to talk online, with some feeling left out, and others having private messages shared without their permission.
‘‘It got to the point where that became a culture,’’ van Leeuwen said.
A survey conducted by van Leeuwen at the school found 81.8 per cent of the 55 respondents belonged in an online chat group.
Snapchat was the most popular messaging app at 63.6 per cent, followed by Facebook Messenger at 60 per cent.
More than 69 per cent of the respondents were aged between 8-12, while 30 per cent were between 13-15.
However, social media apps Facebook, Snapchat and Instagram required everyone to be at least 13-years-old before they could create an account.
In week three of the intervention, van Leeuwen and Silvester had the girls undergo a ‘‘digital detox’’.
The group of eight students – Dahla Povey, Olivia Frater, Summer Hughes, Kyah Jacobsen, Jordyn Wehi-White,
Sameera Hayes, Charlize Anderson, and Tayla Bennett – were hesitant about the detox at first, but found that a good night’s sleep was just a silent phone away.
‘‘I felt really good because I could sleep better than I could before.
‘‘I felt there was less drama and some friendships became stronger,’’ Jordyn said.
Kyah agreed.
‘‘I got better sleep at night knowing I had nothing to worry about.’’
Following the detox, van Leeuwen and Silvester created a social media chat group in which they were included, and had the girls follow some guidelines.
These included no messaging after 9pm on school nights, only contributing to the chat if you wanted to, empathising with those in and out of the chat, respecting people’s privacy, and having ‘‘good vibes only’’.
Van Leeuwen said all students should be given the tools to navigate the online world, and that the Netherton School girls had become role models.
‘‘I feel like these girls are real risktakers.
‘‘They got vulnerable, and explored who they are as a person and how they want to portray themselves online. They also showed a lot of bravery,’’ she said.
‘‘It’s almost like social media platforms water down empathy and there’s less ownership with what you do. So it all comes back to how you want to show up.’’
Netherton School principal Brook Hill said the digital world was quite controlling over students, as it had become their primary form of communication.
The school decided to get involved once they saw how online communications at home were influencing student’s offline friendships in school.
‘‘From a school’s perspective, we’ve got safety nets and firewalls in place while the students are here, but once they go home, those networks are open.
‘‘You look at the stats of how many children have devices and access to Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat, and there’s that digital footprint they leave and the realisation that it doesn’t go away,’’ she said.
Hill encouraged parents to communicate with their children about their social media use, and to be vigilant.
‘‘I’m immensely proud of the girls. It’s taken a lot of courage. They’ve had to dig really deep and come to harsh realisations about themselves, and that’s not an easy thing to do,’’ she said.