School: He-Mu elementary school
    Chiayi county, N/A, Taiwan

9 students, ages 11-12 worked together to complete this CyberFair project on February 15, 2006. They have participated in CyberFair in the following year(s): 2006

Classes and Teachers: Wu shu-ru,Chen kun-liang,Chen jian-ming,Lu chi-ming,Wu rui-juan,Luo wei-jia,Xu xun-yuan,Zheng yu-ru,Lai wen-wen,Tang jia-pin,Tu you-da,Chen jing-ning,Jian you-cun

E-Mail contact:

Our School's Web Site: http://www.hmps.cyc.edu.tw

1. Description of Our Community

The building of Ali-mountain railway began in 1984, Japanese occupation period. Taiwan Administration Office planed to develop Ali-mountain forest railway. For shipping wood, they began to explore, measure, and design the railway, the building engineering started in 1986 which was managed by the government. The railway between Chiayi and Er-Wan-Ping with length of 66.6 kilometers was finished and began to run in December 1911. By the necessity of developing forestry affairs, the railway was extended to Ali-mountain and built the other branches in addition. Some of the branches were removed gradually after the wood shipping mission was finished, but keep the main line and the main branches. The present running railway between Chiayi and Ali-mountain with the length of 71.4 kilometers is one of the existing three mountain railways in the world.

Ali-mountain forest railway raises its height from Chiayi city with height of 30 meters above the sea level to Ali-mountain with height of 2,316 meters above the sea level. The tourists can enjoy the different plants living from hot, warm, and cold temperature areas along the way. Also can enjoy the spectacular scenery, like mountain ranges and valleys. Ali-mountain forest railway has been turned its role as sightseeing from wood shipping and residents carrying. Because our school stands at the entrance of National Chiayi county Ali-mountain scenery area, even though Ali-mountain is well-known by now, but it still exists some mystery for the tourists who have never been there. So we try to adopt children’s tales, talking and drawing to introduce this interesting trip of ecology and culture.

2. Summary of Our Project

The activity plan of “Children’s tales and drawing about Ali-mountain” by He-Mu Elementary School, Zhong-Pu Xiang, Chiayi county.

Purpose of the activity: 1.To visit and explore the home town in person in order to improve the understanding by the students about our country. 2.Building the teaching materials scientifically by subjects’ studying. 3.The studying subject of this activity is “Ali-mountain forest railway”. 4.To inspire the students to adore our country by designing activities scientifically. 5.The result of this activity is to participate the Web Fair of Taiwan’s Schools.

The tutorial teachers: Chief of teaching affairs: Miss Wu shu-ru Leader of teaching team: Mr. Chen kun-liang Tutorial teacher: Mr. Chen jian-ming Tutorial teacher: Mr. Lu chi-ming

Participant students: Wu rui-juan, Luo wei-jia, Xu xun-yuan, Zheng yu-ru, Lai wen-wen , Tang jia-pin, Tu you-da, Chen jing-ning, Jian you-cun

Teaching plan:

Date:12th, October Activity title: Meeting of explaining to parents, Knowing about Ali-mountain railway Activity place: Principle’s office, Computer room

Activity design: 1.Describing the schedule, purpose, and the affairs related to parents. 2.Knowing about Ali-mountain railway. 3.Dividing the students into groups and training them to use the devices. 4.To make all parents and students fully understand the teaching plan. 5.To provide the students with the knowledge of Ali-mountain railway. 6.Dividing the students into data collecting team, art designing team, word editing team, and computer editing team etc. 7.Practicing proficiently to use the devices, like DV, digital camera, recording pen etc.

Compiling the result: 1.Taking it into the home town teaching materials of the school. 2.Editing “Children’s tales and drawing about Ali-mountain” 3.Editing the related drawing books. 4.Producing the learning sheet of Ali-mountain railway.

3. Our Computer and Internet Access

A. Percentage of students using the Internet at home:more than 50%

B. Number of workstations with Internet access in the classroom:2-3

C. Connection speed used in the classroom:dedicated connection

D. Number of years our classroom has been connected to the Internet:2-3

4. Problems We Had To Overcome

The difficulties we have suffered and their answers 1.Insufficient budget This activity was held mainly by real visit. The traffic spent, food supply, and lodging expenditure are quite a lot for teachers and students of 12 members. We appreciate the Railway Section of Chiayi Forestry Bureau supplying the free train taking and the dormitory in Ali-mountain; in addition, Mrs. Fang rong-hua, the former chief of parents association of Gang-Hua primary school, supplied food and dormitory in Fen- Qi-Hu, so helping us to accomplish this activity by schedule. 2.The time for this activity are not harmonious. The time we spend for this activity mostly on holiday, or in the afternoon of every Wednesday or at noon, but most students would join the other studying during these periods. It’s fortunate to have all the students participate all the way by the coordination among the principle and parents. 3.Devices supports We need lots of the devices from the school, thanks the full coordination by the administration units. 4.The specialty of this studying subject To study the railway belongs to a very specialized subject; we not only bought the relative specialized books, collected amounts of written and web information, but also enriched our knowledge about Ali-mountain railway from the interview with Mr. Yang dao-hang, the vice-chief of Bei-men station, and Mr. Li zheng-xian, a driver of the train. We also thank the browsing volunteer of Recreation Section of the Forestry Bureau to give the students detailed description about the railway and supply them with the precious experience. 5.Insufficient knowledge about computer and technology products Our participants of students are all in their 5th grade of elementary school, only have learned simple internet and document processing of computer. So we taught them the software application of Ulead PhotoImpact and Micresoft FrontPage every Wednesday afternoon.

5. Our Project Sound Bite

Home town education is the most important subject for the primary education. It can improve the affection to love the country by the means of understanding the home town. A case study helps understanding more deeply about the characteristics of the home town; it’s the best resource for the local course of the school. Even though, the main gate of our school stands just on the road necessarily to Ali-mountain-No.18th of Taiwan highway. During the investigating before the activity, there is only one student has traveled Ali-mountain Forest Recreation Area; the number of them has taken the forest train is zero. From the time when the students went to Bei-Men station by bus for 5 minutes, Ali-mountain and the railway awaked their potential affection which was hided deeply in their mind. Ali-mountain is not just Ali-mountain, it’s our home town.

6. How did your activities and research for this CyberFair Project support standards, required coursework and curriculum standards?

To study a subject is a difficult job for a student of elementary school, because to draft the subject and collect its relative information is hard, to visit and explore the location in person is even harder. We integrate the resources of school and society to extend the learning field and feel the beauty of Ali-mountain in person by this opportunity of participating the Web Fair. A beautiful paint or a nice text from the books can’t substitute the frequent surprise from taking the train of Al-mountain forest railway. Computer is a creator of an era, also is the nightmare for parents. Computer and internet build the unlimited path of learning and communication for us, but the web games and the contents with adult or violence usually attract the youth to lose themselves in the internet coffee shops, it’s the deepest terror for parents. So we tune their mind to collect information from internet, produce the drawing book by computer, design web pages by using software, we see the satisfied smile from their faces also get the support from their parents after the web pages comes up one by one, the parents finally realize computer and internet can be used in good way. This activity not only supplies the correct knowledge of computer to the students, but also brings up the ultimate expectation for us to carry out the information education. A studying team is always ignored in education. We performed interviewing, voice recording, photos taking, and notes taking by groups dividing. In the aspect of character producing and drawing, we also performed them by teams. Every student tries his best to finish his assignment, this makes them learn the spirit of responsibility, and we are already the good friends with the greatest harmony.

1) What information tools & technologies did you used to complete your CyberFair project?

The technology facilities we use: Facilities (Purpose) Telephone (Communication, Interview) Computer classroom of He-Mu elementary school (Data processing, information requiring, web pages producing) PC in classroom (Data processing, information requiring, web pages producing) Note book computer supplied by school (Data processing, information requiring, web pages producing) ADSL wide band network (Data and files transmission, discussion, communication) Wireless network (Data and files transmission, discussion, communication) E-mail of official business (Official tie between the tutorial teachers) Area network in school (Data and files transmission) Single lens projector (Teaching discuss for the team) Video and audio facilities (To play multi-media information) Photocopier (To copy information) Scanner (To digitalize the pictures) Printer (To print photos and research data) Digital camera (Visiting, interviewing, activity recording, digitalizing the graphs) Digital video camera (Visiting, interviewing, dynamic data recording) Audio record pen (Interviewing, activity recording, portable disk)

The software we use: Software (Purpose) Microsoft FrontPage (Web page editing and management) Ulead PhotoImpact (Photo processing) Acdsee (Digital photo management) Microsoft Word (Character data processing) Internet Explorer (Browsing the web pages, data requiring and transmission) Yahoo mail box (Communication ties among the team members, data transmission)

The web conditions we use: Web in school: There is a computer classroom in He-Mu elementary school equipped with 40 PCs connected to the local area network of the school, and links to internet by the speed of T2. We process the information in the computer classroom, but arrange them mostly by the computer installed in each class.

Web in families of the teammates: Every teammate has his (her) computer at home, but just some of them can connect to the internet. So they only can process character information at home, and then arrange the results on the computer in class through e-mail, disk, or portable disk.

2) In what ways did you act as "ambassadors" and spokespersons for your CyberFair project both on-line and in person.

To fit the information into the teaching is one of the important tasks for the education of 9 years’ coherence. To collect information from internet is the available ability for students, to transmit information through web communication routes is the advanced skill, to demonstrate the integrated information or results by using computer multi-media software is our expected high level destination. By intensive training for three months, the students were mature to employ internet, document editor, and graphic editing software, so as to integrate them as the web pages. It’s the precious experience for producing report or manages information in the future.

This activity was held mainly by real visit. The traffic spent, food supply, and lodging expenditure are quite a lot for teachers and students of 12 members. We appreciate the Railway Section of Chiayi Forestry Bureau supplying the free train taking and the dormitory in Ali-mountain; in addition, Mrs. Fang rong-hua, the former chief of parents association of Gang-Hua primary school, supplied food and dormitory in Fen- Qi-Hu, so helping us to accomplish this activity by schedule.

3) What has been the impact of your project on your community?

Ali-mountain is famous both abroad and at home; Ali-mountain railway also turns its function from wood shipping to sightseeing. During this transformation, as members of Chiayi citizen, we have to realize the beneficial sightseeing environment of our home town, and introduce it to the world by any opportunity. We hope our endeavors can bring more tourists to visit Ali-mountain and its railway, to perform our duty for the increasing economic development of home town and the country. We also hope this activity can initialize more studying groups to join the exploration of this subject to prosper its result.

4) How did your project involve other members of your community as helpers and volunteers?

The assistant teachers: Mr. Lu chih-ming Mrs. Fang hua-ping Miss Hou yi-ru

Assistance: Assisting to study the subjects and structure Directing the web producing Taking care of the teammates when visiting and exploring Directing the drawing

The society resources: Railway Section of Chiayi Forestry Bureau Recreation Section of Chiayi Forestry Bureau Staffs of Bei-Men station Volunteers of Bei-Men-Yi Volunteers of service station Volunteers of train house in Fen-Qi-Hu

Assistance: Tour guidance for the railway Supplying written and multi-media information Arranging the guidance volunteers Accepting interview Supporting schedule and dormitory

5) Discoveries, Lessons and Surprises (Optional)

Discovered and surprised : To see is to believe, We touched the engine of the train at Bei-Men station, and counted the notches by time from the body of the engine. We found the hundred-year’ vicissitude of the forestry at Bei-Men-Yi, thought our ancestors’ wisdom of designing the triangular railway at Zhu-Qi station, praised the extremely fine craftsmanship of the spiral railway around Du-Li hill. The lunch boxes of Fen-Qi-Hu exists strong culture reminding; the red pigweed planted along the two sides of the railway represents our ancestors’ carefulness. Sunrise, forest, railway, cloud sea, and evening sunglow are always charming for the people. Who can refuse the temptation of experiencing the changing weather of spring, summer, autumn, and winter in just one day? Learned : The railway is decayed day by day; the train stations are all old; the divine tree of three thousand years old felt down by the ruining of time. The beautiful things are corroded by time gradually. We hope the relative government unites can integrate the available resources to refresh the life power of the stations and railway, and formulate more perfect forest recreation environment. In this way, we believe more and more tourists who adore the railway and Ali-mountain will be attracted to visit.