Be a Blog Mentor for Al Upton’s miniLegends

Yesterday I wrote of the power of using twitter as a “CallOut” to get help or participation or just say, “Hey, we’re hanging out over at this cool web place.” And late last night, another example twittered my way- getting a tweet from both Sue Waters and Al Upton.

Al does these fantastic web blogging projects with 3rd grade (or properly Year 3) students at Glenelg School in Adelaid, Australia. For his second year of his miniLegends project (those would be his students, see what they did in 2007), Al is asking for edubloggers to become miniLegend Mentors for this year’s students more or less picking a young blogger and agreeing to reglular comment on their blog.

If you’re an educational blogger of any kind (or visitor) and would like to “˜mentor a mini’ then please leave a comment on THIS page saying who you would like to be connected with. The idea is to drop into their blogs from time to time throughout the year and leave a positive comment . Very simple “¦ why not join in the fun?

How could one resist? And there I was at 2am local time signing up.

I first connected with Al last year via some blog comments and have just been utterly amazed at the wonderful work he is able to do with 8 and 9 year old bloggers and web adventurers (see his Quest Atlantis project). He seems to have an upper hand, or at least some cooperation, at his school, and if you are a K-12 teacher, I am sure the approaches he has done to take care of the concerns of kids “protection” is valuable stuff.

Keep an eye on the miniLegends- and (ahem) if 8 and 9 year old kids can get a handle on becoming effective bloggers, there’s no reason why adults should have any trouble, right?

Personally (and unscientifically) that is many of our own problems as “mature adults”- overwhelmed, we’ve lost the play, sense of wonder, and excitement for life that radiates from an 8 year old. We think too much about what other people will say of us, we over analyze, and we operate from fear rather than curiosity.

Grab it back. Now. Your inner miniLegend is still there.