Connect Canyons
Learning is about making connections, and we invite you to learn and connect with us. Connect Canyons is a show about what we teach in Canyons District, how we teach, and why. We get up close and personal with some of the people who make our schools great: students, teachers, principals, parents, and more. We meet national experts, too. And we spotlight the “connection makers” — personalities, programs and prospects — we find compelling and inspiring.
Connect Canyons
Ep 128: From Fear To Balance: Teaching Critical Thinking In A Noisy Online World
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In an era where “logging on” is as routine as brushing your teeth, it is important to prioritize the mental health and digital safety of students. New data from the Utah Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) reveals a striking reality: 80% of Utah students aged 12 to 18 spend at least two hours every day immersed in social media, gaming, or texting.
While this connectivity offers unprecedented access to information, it also brings “heavy realities” into the palms of students’ hands, including exposure to graphic world events and misinformation.
The impact of that digital tether is discussed in this episode of the Connect Canyons podcast, where district experts—including Mental Health Specialist Lori Hunt, School Psychologist Brandon Segura, and Social Worker Shad Roundy—discuss the shifting landscape of student wellness.
Welcome to Connect Canyons, a podcast sponsored by Canyon School District. This is a show about what we teach, how we teach, and why we get up close and personal with some of the people who make our schools great. Students, teachers, principals, parents, and more. We meet national experts too. Learning is about making connections.
SPEAKER_05:So connect with us. According to the latest SHARP student health and risk prevention data from Utah Department of Health and Human Services, a staggering 80% of 78,000 students surveyed ages 12 to 18 spend at least two hours a day immersed in social media, gaming, or texting. While Utah students are more connected than ever, the constant digital tether brings significant concerns regarding the content they consume and its direct impact on their mental well-being. Welcome to Connect Canyons. I'm your host, Stephanie Christensen. Today we are exploring how to support your children as they navigate the heavy realities of the online world. Joining us to share their expertise are Lori Hunt, mental health specialist for Canyon School District, Brandon Sakura, school psychologist for Indian Hills Middle School, and Shad Roundy, school social worker for Alta High. Thank you for being here. Lori, let's start out with you. From your perspective, what does the data tell us about how social media is currently affecting our students' lives at school?
SPEAKER_01:Well, I think we're talking a lot right now in society about social media, our kids having phones, and what they are being exposed to. And I think what the research is showing is it is having a negative impact on their mental health. And I think just what's happening in the news, they're being exposed to images that might be harmful, and they're being exposed to information that might not be accurate. And so I think there's there needs to be more of a conversation about making sure we're helping our kids access reliable information. How do you go about that?
SPEAKER_05:Because here's the balance that I'm having a hard time with. So I find myself seeing things online, and then I want to have the dinner conversation with my kids. And I have a 13-year-old and an 18-year-old. I go to the dinner conversation, that's two very different age ranges. So I have a 13-year-old and they're both very interested, but I don't want to scare them. And so we'll discuss what's happening in the day, and I'll bring up whatever I've seen online, and I kind of test the waters. But how do I go about it without adding extra anxiety? Shed how would you approach it?
SPEAKER_03:I mean, I think there's a lot of resources available to parents that they should be aware of. A few being like common sense media is a really good resource to go through like how you can approach these difficult conversations with the appropriate age. The Child Mind Institute is also really good. The thing is this kids are seeing this stuff online, they're talking to their friends, they are hearing it. So it's better for a parent to not be afraid. I think fear is not a good driving force for change. So if you want to have a conversation with your child, you should. And it really should come from you as a parent because they are hearing about it from their peers, and we know that they're gonna get information that is inaccurate. So if you're feeling nervous, I would definitely use the resources that we kind of that I kind of listed, but also don't shy away from having the conversation. It's really important to have it and to try and have it in a way that's not it's hard to do this, but not totally emotionally driven. I mean, there's gonna be a lot of emotions involved, of course. Uh, and we don't want to, but we don't want to like push our feelings onto our children. We want to kind of gauge where they're at so that we can provide them with support. As adults, we need to kind of take care of ourselves.
SPEAKER_02:And I think also teaching them like critical thinking skills, you know, trying to help them learn to approach some of the things that they're seeing in a way where maybe, for instance, they might recognize that, like, oh, in general, social media has an algorithm and it tends to feed me. Oh, I have like three cat videos, now all I'm getting is cat videos. So recognizing the biases within the system, but I think also in teaching them to think critically, like like things, for instance, a big one that I see that we as a people don't always recognize is confirmation bias. How we are already predisposed towards thinking about something is going to bias the way that we like interpret it and what we look for, what we remember. And then if it's more emotionally late in content, that's also gonna come to mind more likely. Teaching them those skills so they can, as they grow up as well, they can kind of start to evaluate information that they're I have three kids and they've taught me about rage baiting.
SPEAKER_01:And I feel like sometimes they are living in an experience that we might be unfamiliar with. And I think as we learn about what it feels like to them or what it looks like to them, we can help them navigate those waters as well.
SPEAKER_05:I was actually gonna say I have a little bit of hope in that sense, and that my 18-year-old does call me out sometime and say, Mom, calm down. Did you double check that? Yes. And I'm always like, well, yeah, I did check that. And that is fact-based. And he's like, but did you check that from the other side? Are you sure that you're getting an even representation? I'm like, yeah, I did. And he's always telling me that the algorithms leading me towards, and I'm like, okay, you're right. I need to calm down. The thing that concerns me the most is when I was a kid, I just recently we had the anniversary of Challenger explosion. That's how old I am.
SPEAKER_02:I remember that.
SPEAKER_05:I remember being in the classroom and at the time.
SPEAKER_02:And did they roll in like a big TV on that's back in the day when they had the TVs on those cards?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. I remember being there with a teacher and watching it, and it was like, oh at first she didn't know it was a bad thing. It was like, oh, and then it you realize what had happened. But it didn't get played on loop. When bad things have happened in the past, like 9-11, when we originally saw the images, it didn't get played on loop. Now, the images that have come out recently, this is a 24-7 things are happening on loop for our kids, and they're really traumatic. And I worry about our children being desensitized to the violence and horrible things that are happening all over the world.
SPEAKER_01:How do we deal with that?
SPEAKER_05:How do we step back and help our kids step away from those things and even step away from those conversations, even knowing it isn't important that we're aware of it? But like deal with there's some really traumatic things that they've seen. And it it's almost naive to think that they haven't seen images or talked about those images. How do we approach that?
SPEAKER_01:And sometimes even unintentionally, I think in our homes we have the news on all the time. And so they are, I feel like even elementary-aged kids, they even though we they don't have a phone meeting and we think they're not being exposed, they are because they're hearing us have conversations and they could be hearing the news in the background or seeing images. And what I like is the World Health Organization every year puts out a world mental health campaign of something they want to focus on. And this year it was mental health in emergencies and crisis. And one of the factors that they focused on was learning to manage our media. And I think that that's across the board, regardless of our age, we need to learn how to do that. And I think the goal isn't that we're putting our head in the ground and saying, well, my solution is just not to watch any information. I think it's to learn how to limit our information. And if we're noticing that we're particularly stressed over certain events or that there's things happening that feel really alarming and we're not coping as well, we might want to reduce our exposure to 30 to 60 minutes a day. And again, we want to make sure when we're accessing, we're getting reliable sources. And that might be on the phone, but that might not be on our phone. And then I think checking in with other people live also helps us process what we're seeing so that we're not getting kind of stuck.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, and it I mean, obviously Lori said a lot of great things that it I agree with. And I think it's good to point out that I think it is naive to say, oh, that my child hasn't seen this. Um, you know, just a quick example. You know, I have a s I have a seventh grade daughter, and she doesn't really have access to her own personal social media, anything. But at school in art class, another kid is showing another kid on their phone something really, you know, pretty traumatic, and my daughter sees it. So that's a good example of like, well, we can't be naive to that, and we got to have those conversations and check in with our kids. And it's important, especially I work with high school students, and so they really want to be engaged in the world, and they're coming up with their own ideas, their own political ideologies. They're really, they challenge, I mean, as anybody who works with teens, they know they challenge adults. And so there's gonna be often times where they're gonna challenge their own parents' political beliefs. And I don't think that's a bad thing. I think it's good for us to be challenged in that way. But I'm saying that because they also need help with balance. We know their brains aren't fully developing, and the place where they're not developing is the ability to regulate their emotions well and to assess risks. And so as adults, we need to step in and kind of have those conversations, open conversations with them, but from a place of curiosity, not a place of dismissiveness or, you know, trying to change their mind about something, but really help them to have a balanced approach. We had a conversation with a student yesterday. I oftentimes hear, oh, doom scrolling, doom scrolling. And that's different for every kid. Doom scrolling can be that they just are scrolling and wasting time and they're like, that doesn't feel good because nothing's happening. And others, doom scrolling, it's like, well, what's on their feed is pretty intense and that can be difficult. And so approaching media with intentionality, what are we going to the media for? Because if we have unpredictable media use, then we are just going to be overly stressed. That's just the case. And our reactions to what's happening out in the world match what's happening in the world. We're all clearly upset with the violent images we're seeing. Around the world, it's extremely distressing and upsetting. And even in our own country, all the things that are happening. So our response matches what's happening. But if it's at too high of a level, there's nothing we can do. We have like anybody has any of like a certain amount of emotional capacity. And if we're if it that's drawn from too much by seeing too much distressing content, well, then we're not very useful to our families, we're not very useful to our friends, and we're not useful to our community. And so the things we're upset about, we don't have the energy to try and change. So I think it's important for balance. I mean, that's like the big thing. So, as parents, one, you should show that you can do that yourself. When are you checking your media? Do you have like a structured time? And do you have time at home where it's like we're not, there's gonna be no media on, there's no access to information yet? Uh playing on our game. Exactly. Like certain areas that are just like we don't have stuff on. But also like encourage your teens to find ways to be active because if we have things that we're seeing and we feel like there's nothing we can do and feel powerless, then we can become apathetic. But there's always things we can do. We can donate to causes, we can sign petitions, we can join a community, we can peacefully protest. I mean, there's a lot of things that we can do that fills with making a difference. Like you're making a difference, or that you're at least not just like checking out, because I think that's the fear. If we check out, nothing changes. But if we over overuse, then we're we're so distraught that we can't do anything.
SPEAKER_02:And I know you're speaking active in the sense of making a difference. I do think just when we're talking about mental health, I just want to throw in that piece of holistic approach to like being more healthy. I think exercise, eating, all those things come into play as well. And if we're not taking care of the other aspect of our like mental health, I think that things like doom scrolling and too much time on there can have a greater negative impact on us for sure.
SPEAKER_03:Well, and I mean, media with sleep and teenagers. And like, gosh, I can't tell you how many kids I talk to that are like, oh, I was up till three. And this is like a consistent thing. And it's because they have well, it's sometimes access to video games in their room, computers, their phone. How on earth are you supposed to function on three to four hours of sleep? And you can't regulate your emotions. I can't regulate my emotions on that, not even close. And so it this is the parents' responsibility to say, like, there are certain places where the media is turned off, like let these kids sleep. You know, if you're staring and doom scrolling at night, your stress hormones are going up and you're there's no chance you're gonna be able to rest.
SPEAKER_05:The Sharp survey actually said that only 39.2% of kids are getting eight hours or more of sleep. And that that's a pretty grim statistic when you think that less than half are getting enough sleep.
SPEAKER_01:And those are things we can control as parents, that we have the ability to to put limits and in place to teach healthy habits across a lifetime, which is really what we want for all of our kids.
SPEAKER_03:And for parents of young children, I think it's starting now. I think it's really difficult to go backwards and taper back when you've been like a lot of free range. And then all of a sudden you're like, oh, we're putting all these limits. I mean, teenagers are really gonna push back on that. And that can just be really difficult. So for parents of young children, and especially, I mean, even teens and young teenagers like middle school age, you have to make those changes now. You have to have like structure, and there has to be places where it's like we're done with media. This stuff is meant to capture our attention. And adults have a hard time with it. Children, it's nearly impossible. They can't regulate themselves and say, oh, I'm tired. I'm gonna be done with this. This wants us to spend all of our time on it. That's what it's built for.
SPEAKER_01:And it's keeping us away from I think connecting with other people. And I think that's another problem we're seeing is people feel, I think, especially in some of the political climate we're in, people are feeling very divided, and that's causing additional isolation. And so I think it's really important that we find opportunities to put our phones away and to connect live with people.
SPEAKER_05:When do you know if you need help as a parent? When do you know that your kid has crossed over and it's the doom scrolling has crossed into we've got a serious problem and I need to reach out? Like, what are the signs that you need to be watching for? Because sometimes you can take the phone away. Older kids, it's harder. Like once they get into teenage years, it's really hard to know all of their habits. And how do you know when you need extra help and how do you go about getting that extra help?
SPEAKER_02:I mean it might come earlier, but then if you are seeing signs of like hopelessness, uh helplessness, um withdraw, they're more withdrawn, of course, like, oh, is this the beginning of something? Um, you know, are they slightly depressed? So I think there's those more obvious. And then of course, if they're reporting like how they're feeling, like if they're feeling really down about things, and it's like, oh, okay, let's let's let's look for some help. But I do think before that, even if they're not showing those symptoms, if it is like this sort of more like obsessiveness about it, to where it's like that is their life, it's like okay, we gotta we gotta pull that back a little bit. But obviously just having, I think it's important to have those conversations with our children about like, hey, how are you feeling about things? What's going on with you? You know, let's talk. And creating those, um making that be a natural part of your not day in, day out, but just your guys' lives to where it doesn't feel awkward or odd if you go and like, hey, I'm worried about you, but it seems like you haven't been wanting to spend as much time with the family or with your friends, you know, what's going on. So creating those open conversations and so that it'll be natural.
SPEAKER_01:And I'm always surprised to you guys probably see this as you're working with kids, how much kids will really tell us. When we ask in this kind of open way, I'm always surprised how much kids will really say out loud about what's going really going.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, they want to be heard. You know? Even the kids who are struggling the most, they I mean they they want to be heard the most.
SPEAKER_02:It's funny though, because some of them when when they come and I'm talking to them, they're like let's say it's even like suicide or something. They're feeling I mean a little bit of SI. And we're talking about talking to their parents, and almost always they're like, oh, they're gonna be mad at me. It's like you think they're gonna be mad at you? You don't think that they're you know, and it's just shocking to me that that's how they uh feel that sometimes their parents are gonna react to them feeling sad, depressed, is that their their parents will be upset. It's like no, you know, the few people in your life that like are gonna love you the most are most likely your parents or siblings, or you know, of course, for instance.
SPEAKER_05:So what would you recommend to parents to reiterate? Because I I think we think as parents that we're telling our kids that we love them, but how do we reiterate to them on a regular basis that no matter what we're your champions and we love you and no matter what happens, we're there for you. I mean, because we feel like we're saying feel like you're doing it, but if they're still thinking that in those hard times that we're gonna be mad, how do we how do we combat that?
SPEAKER_03:I think you have to one, check yourself as an adult. How do you react when things are difficult? How do you react when you're upset with your child? How do you react when they've disappointed you? Their ability to really understand an adult's emotions, they generally jump to like conclusions like, oh, they'll be mad at me. Well, maybe because the parent is responding out of fear, right? And so we do that. So I think one as an adult, you know, try and really assess like how do I react to this? The other thing is if you you're like, oh, I I tell them, well, keep telling them, keep showing them. I mean, I don't think there's any other we all feel, oh, I've told them that I love them. When was the last time you told them? Whatever. I know I don't know. I think you can I don't know if you can necessarily you could oversay it, I guess. Like a kid would eventually get annoyed if you're just here saying it constantly. But yeah, but there's like but also they want to hear it, and teenagers especially, they're gonna respond kind of in a weird way, like it feels sometimes uncomfortable when their parents are like, you know, I care about you, you know, like on the heck, yeah, I know, like back off. But as a parent, like lean into the discomfort, say it again.
SPEAKER_02:Do you know I'd uh yeah, I'd be curious to even just a conversation, like how do you know that I love you? What is it that I do? And hearing what what it is that they report, you know. Um just even when you're thinking about like adult relationships, it's like you know, everyone has their different love language, and and how is it that you show love to someone may not be the way that they um they see it as being? Does that make sense? Or it's like, oh, I prefer this or that, or or when you sit down by with me and helping me with my homework, that means a lot to me. Or maybe they're like, that really bothers me. But when you do this, this is how you know I really know that you care about me. And having those conversations.
SPEAKER_05:You're with students every day. We've talked about some really dark things. What are the hopeful things that you're seeing?
SPEAKER_03:I would say like for every generation, there's there's always been distressing content. Right. I mean, there's always been difficult things that have been happening throughout every generation that we've had to face. And watching this generation working with teenagers, I think it's just that there's a thing about teenagers that I personally love and enjoy. I think there is just this energy and spirit about them that they have, that they want things to change and they want to try and and push things for change, and they're pushing limits. I think that's really awesome. It can be difficult and frustrating for parents, but I think that's what's promising about teenagers. They s and especially in today's world where you know there's no hiding the truth. Um, and so what they'll do is they'll they'll challenge each other, um, they'll challenge other adults, they challenge the systems that we work in. Do they always do it in the best way? No. But I think trying to encourage that, to continue to encourage that is helpful, but in a way that is productive. But I think that's that's what I've noticed. And I've noticed something that's been kind of cool recently, and maybe it's just you know, a couple individuals. I work a lot with just individuals. So it's hard to say this is what's going on big time. But most of them are saying, like, I'm kind of sick of all the stuff I'm seeing on social media. I'm hearing a lot of them themselves like, I'm taking a social media break. So they're and it's not for to check out, it's to really check in with themselves and be like, I'm not feeling good. I'm not connecting to the people around me. And so they're challenging and like social media platforms by saying, I don't want to be a part of this. So I think that's promising. And they still have hopes, they still have dreams, they still want to pursue things. That always gives me hope.
SPEAKER_02:And I think that what I see sometimes is that open mind, like they're open to new ideas, um, which as adult in as adults sometimes there's something called like a status quo bias, where we have the tendency to remain the same even if there's like contradictory information provided. It's kind of like, no, I'm just gonna stay how I am because it's easier. But I see with uh younger some of the younger kids, I I do see this more of an openness to like, oh, it could be this or it could be that, or and not just this fixed mindset. You know, we talk a lot about like a growth mindset. I mean and I see that.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah. And they don't have that same confirmation bias as deep as the rest of us do, as you talked about it. So like that's hopeful. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:And they're willing to consider, I think, other viewpoints. They do, I do am impressed with their ability to consider things from lots of different perspectives, and their, I think, a sense of non-judgmental about different people's values or political affiliations or maybe style of how they're living. I think they are more open. And so I think, you know, I have a senior in high school, and what I've loved, him and his friends don't text anymore. They call each other. And as a mom, nothing makes me happier than to hear him connecting with his friends through phone calls and FaceTime and in-person versus texting and doing other things. They have that ability, and I feel like they're bold and they're not as scared. Like I feel like they are um, they're more secure in some ways in who they are. And I think I always worried about getting in trouble. And I feel like kids have a little bit more boldness behind them now. Definitely.
SPEAKER_05:Is there anything else that you would like to leave with parents as far as um where they could reach out to get help through the canyons or like just in general as far as social media help?
SPEAKER_02:Well, I don't know about social media help, but if the if a parent is concerned about the the mental health of the their child, you know, they can reach out to if they don't know where to go, they can reach out to the school, school counselor, the school social worker, school psychologist, and kind of start that conversation to either find out, do I want to give support from the school or do I want to look somewhere else for that support? Because then we can at least provide information regarding that. There's things like the Canyons Family Center that can provide certain supports as well. The school does have a lot of rich resources or uh personnel who can help uh at least start that conversation and help with the particular child as well.
SPEAKER_01:And I think there's uh the Canyons Family Center offers both supports for individuals as well as for parents. There's groups parents can do about helping a child who's struggling with anxiety. And then there's a group that their child can take where they're learning similar skills. The Canyon Center also offers one time a month, they have a crisis counselor who's available if something's happening with your child and you just want things checked out. There's mental health screening nights, and I they've got two more coming up March 12th at Midvell Middle School, and again, May 7th at Lbn Middle School. So I think if you are concerned and you're thinking, I'm not sure if something's going on, but I'm wondering, that's a great place to start just to get information. And then there's lots of options in the community. There are a lot of free resources available to families, or I can even help people access their insurance panels and information to find more specific resources. So I think starting with your school, like Brandon said, is a great place to go. And then you can expand. They can help connect you with additional resources as needed.
SPEAKER_05:And we'll make sure to put your information in the show notes. Perfect.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah. And we do that a lot. I mean, I talk to parents often about, and they're like, maybe I don't want it in school. It's going to be too kind of intrusive to their schedule. Okay. Well, we know a lot about free resources or resources available out in the community. Utilize the people at the school that can help, school counselors, school psychs, school social workers. And just to reiterate what I said earlier, if you're struggling on knowing how to have these conversations with your children, especially related to digital literacy or whatever we want to call it, like common sense media gives really good guidance. Parentguidance.org is a wonderful resource for parents on a ton of different topics. They have you can ask a therapist a question and it's a recording and they kind of answer questions, or there's like actual courses you can take and it's free. The Child Mind Institute. I mean, the internet's full of a lot of garbage, but it's full of a lot of useful resources as well. Take the time to get a little bit of guidance on how to have those conversations with your kids.
SPEAKER_01:And people in the school can even help adults get connected. Like if a parent's wondering, like, I don't know where to go, you could reach out to somebody in the school and they could say, here's some good resources, again, as a starting place.
SPEAKER_05:As we wrap up today's conversation, it's clear that while the digital world is vast, our students don't have to navigate it alone, and neither do you. The district offers a variety of specialized resources designed to support both students and parents in managing the mental health challenges of today. Thank you for joining us. Thank you, Lori, Brandon, and Chad, for sharing your expertise and for the incredible work that you do daily in our schools. And to our listeners, thank you for tuning in to Connect Canyons. We want this podcast to be a reflection of what you need. If there is a specific topic you'd like us to dive into, or if you have questions about today's episode, please reach out to us at communications at Canyons District.org.
SPEAKER_04:Thanks for listening to this episode of Connect Canyons. Connect with us on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram at Canyons District, or on our website, CanyonsDistrict.org.
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