3 Ways to Connect Virtually During the Global Pandemic

Like many of you, our family is making use of technologies to connect virtually with people we love. This virtual connection allows us all to respect the guidelines to stay home and keep a safe physical distance, but gives us a chance to catch up, support each other and hopefully have some laughs.

In this series on Emerging Trends for Social Connection (in a pandemic), I’ll explore four trends:

1. Connecting and Re-connecting with Neighbours
2. Caremongering
3. Everyday heroes
4. Connecting Virtually

Here are three tips that may help you to use technology to connect virtually with those you love.

1) Schedule Regular Family Video Conference Calls

My dad and his partner Susan live on the other side of the country from me. My mom lives at my sister’s home in the basement suite. One of my aunts lives a few blocks away from us in an apartment by herself. My sisters and brother live in various places in North America and even with one sister at a close 20 minute drive, we’re not seeing each other in person as we #stayhome and keep a #socialdistance.

So how can we stay connected?

We’ve scheduled twice weekly family video conference calls to connect virtually. These calls happen at a regular time on the same video conference line so everyone has it in their weekly schedules.  This is a time when we all get together and talk about whatever is going on. We try to have some laughs, share a story of two, and talk about how we are coping with sheltering in place.  Some highlights have been when some of the children share a magic card trick or a cello performance.

One challenge during this time is having good topics of conversation as we connect virtually. A lot of times, reconnecting is a conversation about what you’re up to, and during these times where everyone is honouring the request to #stayhome, there aren’t as many external activities to talk about. Some of the popular topics of conversation have been:

• • What are people cooking?
  • Are people learning / doing anything new? Or renewing an old hobby? And how is this going?

• • What kinds of home improvement projects are underway?
  • What are you doing that have always been on the list but you never get around to?
  • Anything funny happy this week?
  • Any exciting plans for the weekend?
  • And of course, how are people coping?

What’s funny about this is that in the past, we didn’t use technology to connect virtually.  And while it is definitely more fun to connect in person, it’s been interesting to see how technology can help us to virtually glom.

2) Create Time for Virtual Socializing & Schoolwork

The approach for keeping kids connected with their friends depends on their ages and their needs. We’ve got two teenagers, so in many ways, it’s relatively easy – they are self-sufficient and arrange to connect virtually with friends. My 17 year-old daughter connects with her friends mainly using Instagram groups and messaging. My 14 year-old son connects with his friends mainly through online gaming.

Through these platforms they set up times to connect virtually with friends to work on homework together, or if there are group assignments, set up times to work as a team together. My son likes to use Skype on his computer to talk live with his friends. My daughter uses a variety of different platforms to connect with her friends, including Snapchat, Instagram, Facetime.

The technology platform itself is not as important as the social connections with friends. Of course, as a parent, I want to make sure that my children are choosing a secure platform and understand what is ok to post or send their friends and what is not. But the reality is that they are growing up in this digital world. They are used to being able to connect and get information in real-time about anything they want.

In another turn of events, my daughter has also become an ad-hoc homework helper for her younger cousin. Both my daughter and my nephew are in French Immersion, and when the homework assignment is in French, and he doesn’t understand it, they will organize a homework helping session. He will share his screen with her, and show her the assignment, and then she is able to explain it to him.

Even my mom, their grandma, gets in on the action. She was a math teacher and sometimes she gets asked to explain a concept as well.  She has hit it out of the park with charts and diagrams that have been really useful to effectively explain complex math problems.

3) Set Up Virtual Playdates

With younger kids, having a set date/time for a connection with their friends and a bit more structure can be helpful to provide predictability and regular things to look forward to during the week. Through social media and news articles, I have come across examples of success stories from other parents that might inspire you: 

1. 1. Kids who have a shared interest in a particular activity that they normally play together in-person can have successful virtual playdates using that same activity. For example, if they both like to build with Lego and they both have Lego in their homes, they can have a virtual Lego playdate. They can both build with their respective Lego sets and then show each other what they made.
   2. Is there a baker in the house? I saw one group of kids who exchanged a recipe a few days earlier, and parents who made sure all the ingredients were available and then they had a virtual baking playdate and were able to show each other their creations at the end. You can imagine this can be really fun if you make something that requires decorating like cookies or cupcakes as you get a chance to show off your own individuality.
   3. Some of the platforms let you put special effects on your face or capture screenshots easily. My niece, who is 8 years-old, loves to put effects on my face while I’m talking with my sister. She took the least flattering photos of me I have EVER SEEN while we were talking on a video call. She was falling down with laughter as the call went on. And then later, when she shared the photos with me, we were all in tears laughing at how terrible they were. Think photos shot from below your face, with your eyes closed or partially closed, and you’re caught mid-sentence. THE WORST!  These photo effects can create tons of fun on both sides of the call and are only available through the use of technology.

PS. I did think about including the photos for a split second, but NOPE. Nobody needs to see those!!

Get Virtually Connected

For those of you wanting to connect virtually, there are a variety of tools you can use. It’s always a good idea to do a search and see if there are any security concerns with the tool or platform you are thinking of using. At the end of the day, the tool or technology is less important than just reaching out and making the connection.

And when in doubt, you can also just pick up the phone.

As we navigate the challenges of this global pandemic together, we’re faced with new challenges about how to stay connected with our friends and families.  Thankfully, many of us are fortunate to have these technologies available to help us check in on and support one another during this trying time.

Connecting virtually is not the same as being physically together, but right now, it’s the next best thing. And you never know, even after the shelter in place restrictions are lifted, we might just keep keep up our weekly family calls to connect virtually in between our in-person family glomfests!

So how are you staying virtually connected with your loved ones? We would love to hear your thoughts in the comments section below. 

Photo by Fabio Bracht on Unsplash

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