Ken Greene's Comments

Thank you for the note, and the invitation to communicate with you/your students. I will pass that information along to our music teachers. We are just beginning to look at ePals, so interest is only cursory at the moment, but I will give them the link to your web site, and hopefully, it will generate at least some curiousity.
Beautifully done, by the way, and what wonderful projects!
Kudos!

NEPAL (Never Ending Peace and Love)
Never forget to see
East, West, North n South
Pals want you to meet
All wish you healthy and fit
Love n peace is always so sweet.
- Swachalika (Class 3, SAV School)
Family
Family is a tree
Member are its branches
Father and monther
Giver us fruits and crunches.
Parents are like God
Caring, sharing and guiding
We love them so much
They hate fighting.
- Rabin Shrestha (Class 5, SAV School)
Friendship
HELLO from nepal
How nice to see u in epal,
Wherever we are in the world
We come close to explore.

Friendship is good
It gives us happy mood,
I love my epals
Be open and always good.
- Sagun Phuyal (class 5, SAV School)
Peace
Nepal is my country,
Mt. Everest is my pride,
Buddha was born here
His teachings makes us bright.
Buddha loved peace
So do I,
I want to tell you all
Peace is so nice.

my skype id is govinda.prasad.panthy1

Dear Ken, do you use skype id? i see you online now. you can read what our students have written for your and your students' information.
My Country- Nepal
My country, Nepal, lies in South Asia. It’s I known as the country of Mt. Everest also. Nepal is famous for second richest country in water resourc and country of natural diversity. Along with cultural diversity, it is the country of geographical and climatic variation also. In the south there is plain area where is very hot. In the middle, there are hills covered with forest and agricultural fields. In the north taller and tallest mountains and top of the world lie with their highest peak.
Besides, Nepal is full of rivers, ponds, and valleys. Our country is full of natural beauties. Tourists from many parts of the world come to Nepal to see beautiful scenes of nature and snow-capped mountains. Regarding history of Nepal, it is the country of Gautam Buddha. Buddhists regard Nepal as a place of destination since it is birth place of Buddha. We are proud of being a citizen of the country of Buddha and Everest.We love our country not because of only buddha and Everest but because of also religious and cultural tolerance among people. There are hundreds cultures, religions, castes and races but they have never misunderstood. They have been living being brothers and sisters of the same country.
Nepal is beautiful but it is a bit backward in development. Nepalese are hardworking but no leader of the country led the people for development. My country is waiting for a real leader to lead the people to the real world of development. Anyway, I love my country and culture.
We respect all the religions and cultural groups.
Grade V, SAV School.
My School
My school, SAV School (Shantideep Adarsh Vidhyasadan, English translation Peaceflame Ideal School) , established in 1996, lies in the village of Bageshwori, Bhaktapur, Nepal. It is a Primary school. It is an English medium School. There are 7 teachers, a principal and 127 students. Our school is very simple. It has simple building and simple classrooms. There is a blackboard or a white board in each classroom. There are wooden benches in our classroom. We have small play ground where we play local games like hide and seek, Elephant chase, etc. We play ball and rings too. We love playing many games at home and school.
Our school starts at 9:45am and finishes at 4 pm from Sunday to Thursday. And on Friday, school finishes at 1pm. We have 7 periods (subject classes) every day.We learn English language, Nepali language, Math, Science, Social studies, G.K.(General Knowledge) etc. We have extra activities like competitions or programs on Fridays. We participate on essay writing, poem writing, drawing competitions, mathmatical races, games etc. At 1 our luch time starts. We have lunch time for 40 minutes. We bring some food from our home and eat. We bring beaten rice, roasted corn, roasted wheat, biscuits, chapatis, etc. for our lunch. And some of our friends bring noodles or bread sometimes.
Though our school is small, We love our school. Our school founder is very nice man. He always supports us for every activity. He is very positive. He is very optimistic. He gives us hope. We wish our all teachers could speak English. We love our teachers and friends.
Grade 4 Students.

Hey Ken.
Great idea.
I will be looking at the threads posted by you and will also include the music teacher at our school Jake Eades .
Will get back to you next week for sure.

You bet, Ken. We'll be back to you all.

Jay

I really wanted your kids to be able to see what my kids look like - I think I will take a picture of the class and put that in as the avatar and then have them leave the comments - can I keep adding comments or will it be all on the same one comment? The students are going to be working with red ribbon week this week - there will be some presentations - dancing, posters, poems and students talking about being drug - free. I will try to send this for Nov. 1st.

Hi Ken,
I used voicethread a couple of years ago with a class in New Zealand. It is a great tool. I will talk about your request with our music teacher Aryo. I'll get back to you after I have talked to him.
Jane

As soon as I have a chance I will check out those links. Just wanted to make contact. I will get back to you soon.
Thanks, Mindy

Hi, I also like voicethread.com. Here is a Turkish lesson I created for an Italian teacher who is trying to learn Turkish. It shows a typical Turkish breakfast and teaches some words. Hope you like it. Kristina

My sons and I viewed the voice thread. Jr. High kids are all the same - that is why I love that age!!!!!. I'm excited to show my students this - I will probably do this on Friday in Health class. And is my understanding correct, that we can make a comment back either with voice or typing - there is also a way for video comments right - All our laptops have the cameras?

This voicethread was created by my 8th and 6th grade general music students. We hope to meet students from around the world, discover what we have in common with each other, and strengthen our global perspective through meaningful conversations and engaging collaborations.

Please post your comments - text, audio, or video - and tell us about yourselves. What would you like us to know about you? What do you have in common with us? We look forward to meeting you!

I think you have it going on here with technology. You have a classroom setup for this activity. I will look into it a little more. Do you have good luck with students bloging/ chating/responding about the classroom assignment? Thanks Tami Dodson

Ken, I told my 8th grade students about you and your classes - they said they would love to meet your 8th grade students - could we do this sometime on video chat or what other means could there be - we have v-tel?

Hello Ken, I saw yours website, and I heard yours Voicethread. I am very impressed. It is a great work. I teach college (undergraduate and graduate) students and my classes are not the right one in that stage for the kind of activity you suggest. I will keep track you throw Twitter.
Thanks a lot. I hope we will find an opportunity to cooperate in the future
Yours
Gil Amit

I have had to have PE out in our parking lot since school has started - since they decided that they would put a new floor in my gym when school started -I'm to be back in the gym by next Monday (I really hope so - it is really getting cold out). I'm to have 6 computers for my gym when I get in. I would love to do something with the idea of "you reap what you sow" and team work. I was thinking of have a group of three or four(with one computer) come up with something they could publish with the theme of "your reap (in the future) what you sow (now). And of course it would have an activity flavor to it.Thank you for the invite on Nov 1st. If we get inside - I will see what we can get put together.

I like the idea and I'll be back to you.

Jay

I think my students would really enjoy that. Thanks for the invite.

I signed up for the free voice thread for educators and played around with it yesterday. We have today off for Native American day, I'm going to mess with it more. I was reading an book called "The Strangest Secret". Here is an exert from it: "Suppose a farmer has some land, and it's good, fertile land. The land gives the farmer a choice; he may plant in that land whatever he chooses. The land doesn't care. It's up to the farmer to make the decision.
We're comparing the human mind with the land because the mind, like the land, doesn't care what you plant in it. It will return what you plant, but it doesn't care what you plant.
Now, let's say that the farmer has two seeds in his hand- one is a seed of corn, the other is nightshade, a deadly poison. He digs two little holes in the earth and he plants both seeds-one corn, the other nightshade. He covers up the holes, waters and takes care of the land...and what will happen? Invariably, the land will return what was planted.
As it's written in the Bible, "As ye sow, so shall ye reap."
Remember the land doesn't care. It will return poison in just as wonderful abundance as it will corn. So up come the two plants - one corn, one poison.
The human mind is far more fertile, far more incredible and mysterious than the land, but it works the same way. It doesn't care what we plant...success...or failure. A concrete, worthwhile goal...or confusion, misunderstanding, fear, anxiety and so on. But what we plant must return to us.
You see, the human mind is the last great unexplored continent on earth. It contains riches beyond our wildest dreams. It will return anything we want to plant."
I was thinking of having my students reflect on what they sow in their lives and minds and what it might reap in the future. Sometimes on the reservation life can look so bleak - however I would like them to know it doesn't have to be that way - if they so choose. This is a project I would like to do. Jeannine