Tag: election 2010

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School’s out Friday

I love this ‘mockumentary’ I found after following a Twitter link this week. (sorry, can’t remember who it was that sent it out). ‘The Majestic Plastic Bag‘ serves a dual purpose. Great for a giggle, but there’s a serious message behind it that we all should heed. I used it in two classrooms this week and the kids were right onto it. All of them agreed that it was better hearing and seeing the message via this format rather than hearing a teacher talk about it. Yet another reason why I send my students to YouTube and encourage them to seek out the learning opportunities that can be found there.

Big weekend here in Australia. Election day tomorrow. I’ll be glued to the screens (both old media and new!) waiting for the first hint of who might carry this one off. I’ll be fascinated to observe the workings of Twitter tomorrow. Will it be the place where we will hear things first? Is the user base large enough and varied enough to ensure a decent spread of the community? Will hashtags evolve that will enable us to track interesting developments? I’ve already seen one of our major commercial networks advertising that they’re going to be screening a twitter stream throughout the course of the evening. What is apparent is that it’s going to be interesting and social media may be one of the things that makes it so.

Melbourne is hideously cold – has been for quite some time now. I can see blossoms erupting, but I’m desperate for the first hint of a warm breeze. Hopefully it will happen this weekend, but to be honest with you, I already know that I’m hoping in vain.

Enjoy your weekend and whatever it brings with it. : )

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School’s out Friday

School might be out this evening for most of us, but for the politicians of Australia, it’s nose to the grindstone 24/7 for the next 3 weeks. It’s election time here. We’re in the midst of a hard fought political stoush here in Australia, with some touting it as the dullest campaign ever. For the first time ever we have female leader of the Labor Party, Julia Gillard, and she’s battling criticism over the size of her earlobes, her dress sense, and what did or did not transpire in the party room when she challenged Kevin Rudd for leadership of the party. A political heavyweight, journalist Laurie Oakes, has really targeted her throughout this campaign, so much so that I think he’s starting to win Julia the vote of more than a few women out there who see it as a vendetta against her.

In terms of advertising, it’s been pretty dull. Perhaps both parties need to adopt these adverts, developed for the ABC program, ‘The Gruen Nation‘. I particularly like the Julia Gillard one, and the idea of a nightly forum answering the questions of the people. I think they’re onto a winner there! I didn’t see the actual program, but my friend Helen recommend that I try and locate these for School’s out Friday as we enjoyed a meal together tonight. We were both speculating how useful these would be in our classrooms as we try and convey to our students the impact the media has on our lives.

So while the pollies slog it out on the hustings, I’ll be slogging it out at the gym and the grocery store, and then I might do battle with the washing machine. There was a time in my life when I contemplated entering the world of politics, but right now, I think I’m content with my small scale domestic duty conflicts. After seeing what Julia has had to endure, I doubt my self esteem would survive the intense scrutiny of a politician’s life today.

Make the most of your weekend. They seem to go by pretty fast these days. At least we’ll all probably be nabbing a few more hours sleep than Julia and Tony will.  : )