Social Media Impact
On social media this week, I stumbled upon the video "Empty Seat PSA" on YouTube. The video goes through a series of different scenes showing an empty seat in a classroom, and empty easel in the art room, pom poms lying on the ground at a football game, a kid playing himself in chess, a missing letter at a pep rally, a one-man band, and then a mother bringing out a birthday cake to an empty seat. The video then goes on to show kids attending a funeral. The words " Don't let there be another empty seat" read across the screen. It shows all those empty seats being filled and then it reads "you can help, know the signs" it lists different signs of suicide and what to look for. "Take them seriously, listen, tell someone...it's better to lose a friendship, than a friend" and ends with listing the National Suicide Hotline's phone number.
At first watching this video I wasn't really sure what the meaning behind it was. It made me think though. I was wondering is it about kids who are missing classes, whether it be skipping school, or problems at home or what have you. Which then when we reach the scene of an empty seat where a mother is giving a birthday cake to no one. I finally realize that this is someone who is no longer with us, and it then becomes even clearer in the next scene when it is that person's funeral. Now, for some people they might have got the message right away, but the reason I liked this video was because it made me think and it told a story, but then went on to show what to look for in terms of signs of preventing suicide so that you don't have to experience those empty seats.
This video really impacted me because as a future educator my mind doesn't always go to the fact that one of my students may be struggling so badly that they consider taking their own life. It really put things into perspective for me and will be something that as an educator it will be my job to be totally aware of and to be able to know the signs and do something about it if I ever think a student of mine is in trouble. We all want to think about the good in every situation and think about all the positives that we can bring into our future student's lives. However, at the end of the day all of our future students are real people with real lives with real problems, and unfortunately, a lot of young people don't realize that the problems they are having today aren't forever even though it may feel that way and that although at the time it feels like things will never get better, eventually they always do.
"It's better to lose a friendship, than a friend", what this means is if you ever feel your friend is in trouble and you need to do something about it, yes, the friend may be mad at you, but you doing something about it could save their life. Suicide is preventable, we just have to not look at it as taboo and talk about it and help to prevent it. Life is too precious to have it be taken away.
That's all for now!
--Danielle
Danielle,
ReplyDeleteThis blog was so necessary I'm glad you chose to blog about the topic of suicide. I don't think people realize how much of an impact they make on one another. Sometimes we can see students or even other adults struggling with something and we just can't put our fingers on it but we know something is wrong. All it takes is a moment of our time to just reach out to someone and ask about their day and we can learn so much more than what we asked about. I deal with suicidal students daily and my job is to make them feel a sense of belonging and try to do things or say things that really touch them and remind them how important they are to society. Sometimes they are resistant but we can't give up just because they want to give up. We have to keep trying and maybe we will succeed, just maybe we can save a life.