Blog #5 - Evaluation of book drive

Due Wednesday, February 4th. 200 words minimum.

Reflection time!

A couple questions to think about as we reach the completion of the book drive. As of Monday night, we have over 6,700 books; we're 2/3 of the way there!

So, here are the questions:
1. How do you think these books and money collected will affect the schools and kids of northern Uganda? Explain.

2. How do you feel that the Groves community has responded so strongly to the book drive? Why?

Thanks.

Invisible Children on YouTube

Hey guys and gals, if you want to show your friends and family the video, Invisible Children, I have found it here on You Tube. It's broken up into 5 segments. If the embedded videos don't work, just follow the links beneath each video and watch it there.

Please be forewarned that in each of the vidoes, PG-13 subject matter is covered ranging from violence and civil war, discussion of contraception, images of dead soldiers, and other scary stuff. In the first two clips, the three guys who make the video Jason, Bobby, and Laren, get sick and vomit. Also, their host, Jolly, shows them how to behead a chicken. The images are brief, but still graphic.

PLEASE VIEW FOR YOURSELF BEFORE SHOWING TO ANY YOUNG TEENAGER.



Part 1 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qds5MQCqWnk



Part 2 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=viEMFvP4kPM



Part 3 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Ped11Culq0



Part 4 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnqAdV40QTE



Part 5 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJnYcHWx6H4

Trailer for the feature film of Invisible Children!

Whoa! Guys and gals, I may have told you that Jason, Bobby, and Laren of Invisible Children are working on a full length version of their film. I just found the "teaser" trailer, and as you can see below, it goes beyond what we've already seen in our version.




Intense stuff!

If the video above doesn't work, click this link:

http://www.invisiblechildren.com/media/videos/detail.php?id=217720924

You'll be glad to know that the staff was very receptive to the film today (Monday, Jan. 19). They are getting behind the book drive even more, and some classes will begin a 1st hour competition to see who can bring in the most books, DVDs and CDs. Also, released library books are fine, so let's go out and find them!

T-shirts will be here Thursday. Make sure you bring your money by Wednesday. Also, Mrs. Brice has contacted the Baldwin Library to see if they have any extras they'd like to donate.

Also, in order to collect as many books as possible, we may have to consider extending the book drive one more week to include other schools in the district so that they can have their own "micro" drives. This would mean that we'd miss out on the contest, but since we had such a late start on it to begin with, I don't know how much of a chance we had. One question to think about is: why are we doing this? Are we doing this for a contest? Or are we doing this so that we can help out those who are in desperate need of a better life?

We'll talk on Tuesday in class.

Ideas for the book drive

There were a ton of great ideas on blog #3 - here are just some of them:

1. Go to church and ask the congregation for books.

2. Go door to door in my neighboorhood asking for books.

3. Make a pamphlet that can be used to explain the book drve and/or Invisible Children.

4. Make a big sign to hang by the football field or near the entrance of the school as a reminder of the book drive.

5. Bring boxes.

6. Have a showing of the movie at Groves.

7. Contact the local newspaper about the book drive.

8. Hold a bake sale to raise money for the book drive and/or IC.

9. Connect the book drive with sports - pass out fliers at games.

10. Find books around the house and bring them to school.

11. Sell the bracelets / t-shirts to raise money and awareness.

12. Talk to teammates or other members of your club/group.

13. Email / call family and friends about the book drive and collect the books from them.

14. Spread the word about the book drive and IC around Groves to friends and teachers.

15. Create a Facebook (www.facebook.com) group and invite everyone you know to it.

16. Go to Baldwin library and see if they have books to donate.

17. Put up the posters everywhere we can.

18. Get the FANN announcements going.

19. Have a donation box set up at lunch.

20. Get the parents involved.

21. Go to Borders and talk to the management and see if they have books to do donate.

Great job, guys.

Blog #3 - Think of new ways to promote the book drive!

Hey,

I know we brainstormed a couple of ways of promoting the book drive. What I would like you to do here is come up with three ways that you can:

1. personally push/promote the book drive and

2. what kinds of action can you do to make those things happen?

For instance, you could say "I'm gonna call my uncle, Steve, b/c I know he's got a lot of books and see if he has any extras. Then I'll have my mom drive me over to his house this weekend, pick them up, and bring them to school on Monday, January 12."

This may seem like an easy blog (10 pts). But the hard part will be to keep your end of the deal by following through with your three suggestions (5 pts. extra credit per suggestion with my approval).

Due Friday, January 9.

Remember, just 7 books!

Helping Invisible Children - Child Soldiers

Here's a commercial for Invisible Children, a movie about child soldiers in Uganda we're going to watch when we get back from break. The commercial takes a joking look at something most of us hate but turning it into something positive.




Plus, the website and organization for Invisible Children is sponsoring a book drive that ends January 30, 2009. We can collect our school's goal of 10,000 books. In fact, I'll bet we can probably do even more.

Check out the website, http://www.invisiblechildren.com/theMovement/ , and start collecting those books. Here's a list of books that they won't take, but they will take mostly everything.

Start looking for those books!!!