Blogical Minds

Educating our legislators!

Emmy and Johnny have completed all their podcasts, transcripts, and posts from the legislative appreciation session in January. Their blogs are good reads on each interview. Last Friday I emailed each of the legislators and pointed them to the student blogs. Here is an email I sent to Representative Roger Bruce whom Johnny interviewed. I sent a similar letter to each one that Emmy and Johnny interviewed. Here's a copy of one of my emails:

Your interview with Johnny at the GSU Legislative Appreciation Night

Dear Representative Bruce,

My name is xxxxxx. I was the teacher who was with the group of fifth grade students at the Georgia Legislative Appreciation night this past January at the Georgia Freight Depot . My name tag read Mrs. C as that is my research name for the

Georgia

State

research project we are studying with this elementary school.. That night you were kind enough to let one of the students interview you.  His name was Johnny.

These students have been using blogging to learn new literacies and share what they are learning with others. Interviewing legislators was the hit of their night. I told the children that I would email each of you who were interviewed and send a link to the post, podcast, and transcript that they included in their blog where they shared the evening’s experience.

If you would like to respond to their post you can do so by clicking on the comment right under their blog post about the interview with you. Then all you have to do is type in your name, email, and url of your web site. The url is optional. Then you type in your response in the comment box and then click ‘Post’.

Thank you for caring about and making a difference in the lives of

Georgia

students.

Here is the link to Johnny’s post:

http://itc.blogs.com/mind3/2007/01/interview_with__1.html

Here is the link to Johnny’s blog:

http://itc.blogs.com/mind3/

If you have any questions you can email me at xxxxxx.

Sincerely,

xxxxxxx

I received this reply to my  email from Representative Bruce.

This is a wonderful project that you have the kids working on. I enjoyed listening to the interview on Johnny's blog site. I was trying to figure a way to make it available on my web site. Maybe Johnny can help me!

 

Rep Bruce

This is  wonderful! Representative Bruce is being educated on the good use you are all putting to blogging about what you are learning. He likes what you are doing and has even mentioned getting Johnny's help.  We'll email him in class and invite him to our school! I hope he will come!  Congratulations blogicians! Johnny was your representative that night but all of you are doing great work!  Let the blogging soar!!

Emmy emails Governor Purdue!

Here is a copy of the letter Emmy created to email to Governor Perdue.

Hello Sonny Perdue

   I’m Emmy. You may not remember me but I had a picture taken with you at the Georgia State Legislator Leader Appreciation Night. You said I could interview you but over e-mail. So here I am e-mailing you. I want you to choose the question or questions you want to answer.
1. How do you use technology in your job as a legislator?
2. What is your favorite part of your job? Your least favorite?
3. Do you have a blog? We see it as a good way to communicate with people and learn. We share ideas and help each other with the comments.
4. Do you think a blog would be helpful in your job? Do you think it would help you communicate with the public and media?
5. Is recess in schools good or bad? Why don’t we have it anymore? Do you support funding for recess equipment? We have very little equipment.
6. What is the best way you have found to let people know what you are doing?
7. What are two issues that are of special interest to you concerning our      schools? How can we help?
8. What are your most important responsibilities as a legislator?
9. Would you blog in your free time?
10. What is your view on poverty and equal educational opportunities for disadvantaged students? Do you support special programs for less fortunate students?
11. Would you support incorporating blogs into schools?
12. How do you feel about keeping music, art, and PE in schools? What should students do to make sure music, art, and PE are kept in schools?
13. Do you support funds for improving technology equipment and staff in schools?
14. Will you comment to our blogs?
15. Do you support redistricting schools so that our student body is diverse?
16. Should fun activities be kept in schools (examples, Halloween parades, assemblies, parties, etc)
17. How can we keep the internet safe at school?
18. We have to drink milk with our school lunch, but we would like to have the option to drink water instead without an additional charge. Would you support this change in menu?
19. Free summer reading programs could be very beneficial to students. How should we fund and implement programs?
20. Students often times aren’t listened to by teachers and administrators. Do you value our opinions and concerns? How should we express ourselves in a meaningful manner that will be listened to by others?

If you could just answer one or a few questions that would be great but if you answered all of them that would be wonderful but that would take a while. So just a few of them would be nice. Since we’re doing this at school I don’t have an e-mail here so could you send your reply by e-mail to my bloging teacher “Mrs.C”. She is the lady who took a picture of you and me. Here is her address: xxxxxxxxxx  I will share your answers with all of my fifth grade class.

Thank you for all you do for Georgia and for letting me interview you. This has been a great honor and I thank you for the interview.

Emmy

P.S. I would like to invite you to my honor chorus performance at XXXXX High School Feb. 3 2:10 we have been practicing on this for a long time so please try and come this might be our honor chorus break through it’s only for fifth graders that’s why it’s called honor chorus.

This answer came back for Governor Perdue's office.

Governor Perdue has received your e-mail and appreciates hearing from you. You will receive a direct response from him shortly.  With the very high volume of messages and mail, we hope you will understand if there is a delay in responding.  If this is an urgent or time-sensitive matter, please call us directly at 404-656-1776.  Again, our thanks for your comments and input.

Please do not reply directly to this message.  Thank you.

Isn't this exciting? We all will eagerly await his answer.  Great work Emmy!

Relevant points from the students

• We think that writing our weblogs is going to be very exciting because it will make us better at writing and commenting.
• We write good stories so that it can catch the reader’s attention.
• You might want to use the six traits of writing in your weblogs.
• Write good stories so that it can catch the reader’s attention.
• Use the six traits of writing in your weblogs.
• Blogging is cool because we can write blogs that people can read next year.  
• It can help us be better at writing.
• The fifth grade is pretty tough. It has a lot of new things. You will always wonder about middle school and other students’ blogs. It teaches you to grow with what you read.

Featuring Group 4 Blog Brainstorming

Again, congratulations is in order for all of you!  Can't wait to see you again in the morning! We'll continue the WebQuest with our tour of student blogs!

Displaying Group 3 Blog Brainstorming

Announcing Group 2 Blog Brainstorming

Presenting Group 1 Blog Brainstorming