CyberFair Project ID: 8401

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International Schools CyberFair Project Narrative
Title: Grass Hope Taiwan
Category: 2. Community Groups and Special Populations
URL: http://cyber.fhjh.tp.edu.tw/GrassHopeTaiwan/
Bibliography: http://cyber.fhjh.tp.edu.tw/GrassHopeTaiwan/bio.html

School: Taipei Fuhsing Private School
    Taipei, Taiwan (R.O.C), Taiwan (R.O.C)

12 students, ages 15-17 worked together to complete this CyberFair project on March 1, 2018. They have participated in CyberFair in the following year(s): Since 2000-2017

Classes and Teachers: JIN,JIA-HAO

E-Mail contact:

Our School's Web Site: http://www.fhjh.tp.edu.tw

Project Overview

1. Description of Our Community

Taipei is the capital of Taiwan. Citizens in Taipei are very busy. Adults pay all their attention on working. In addition, students study very hard. However, busy life style makes people lose touch with natural environment. Therefore, “Grass Hope Taiwan Foundation” promotes the concept of natural farming in Taipei. The headquarters is located in Yangmingshan National Park, which is the only national park in the capital city. Natural farming teaches people to slow down their working pace and enjoy life. The practice of natural farming is also more environmental friendly. Grass Hope Taiwan Foundation also promotes food education in Taipei. Nowadays, people often neglect the importance of eating healthily. Therefore, it is critical for Earth’s Children to find it back.

2. Summary of Our Project

Our Cyber Fair Web project is about “Grass Hope Taiwan Foundation”. It is a local non-profit organization that promotes natural farming and food education. In this project, Earth’s Children want to promote the teaching of Grass Hope Taiwan Foundation to everyone. In addition, we also want to understand more about food education. Therefore, we worked with Grass Hope Taiwan Foundation and learned to be the weekend farmers. We hope that people can enjoy the beauty of natural farming through our Cyber Fair Web project. Research Topics 1. Preserve the history of Grass Hope Taiwan Foundation Why was Grass Hope Taiwan created? What challenges did the members meet? How did Grass Hope Taiwan develop into a NGO foundation? 2. Understand the core values of natural farming and food education 3. Preserve the history of Hudi community at Yangmingshan National Park in Taipei, Taiwan 4. Practice natural farming and promote natural farming 5. Unite the students in campus and promote food education

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:1

C. Connection speed used in the classroom:dedicated connection

D. Number of years our classroom has been connected to the Internet:more than 6

E. Additional comments concerning your computer and/or Internet access (Optional):

Taiepi Fuhsing Private school's external internet has a speed of 30MB green line transfer. There are wireless network and wired network in the school. Every classroom is equipped with a set of computer. The shool also has computer classrooms. We mostly used school time to discuss our website contents, search information, and print out documents. 1.Team Members' Internet Environment at home: Every team member has either PC or laptops at home. We worked on the research project and contact each other through the wifi at our homes. 2.Measures Taken for Processing Information: We used Dropbox and Google Drive to store our photos and writings. Team members worked on their project both at home and at school.

4. Problems We Had To Overcome

Making a CyberFair Web project was really fun. It has taught Earth’s Children many valuable lessons. However, it was not an easy task. Here were the problems that we had to overcome in our CyberFiar project. 1. Managing our time: As the high school students, most of the members in our team are on a very tight schedule. We learned to work efficiently in lunch breaks. To save the meeting time, we also use social media such as messenger and line to post announcements and working lists before meeting. 2. Conducting Interviews: In order to get the first-hand information for our CyberFair project, we have to interviews many people. We realized that a good interview took a lot of preparation. We couldn’t just simply chat with interviewees; instead, we should list all the interview questions before the interview. Being polite is also a very important part for the interviewing process, at first, we were really nervous. After some practices, we were able to clearly express our points and speeded up the interview process. 3. Promoting our research: This year the themes for the CyberFair are “Preserve and Unite”. While we were trying to preserve the unique history of Hudi community and Grass Hope Taiwan Foundation, we also tried to promote them in our campus. We did presentations and Q&A session for the practice of natural farming and food education. These were the great chances for Earth’s Children to overcome stage fright. 4. Stepping out of our comfort zones: One of the most important activities in our CyberFair project was farming. Most of the Earth’s Children never really farm before. It was an unique but challenging experience. We were really happy to have the opportunities to grow our own food and be the weekend farmers.

5. Our Project Sound Bite

The most happy thing in life is to share passion and knowledge with others.

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

oining the International Schools CyberFair project is a great opportunity for students to learn new skills. Here are some things that we learned from this CyberFair project contest. The unique experience made us think that doing a CyberFair project is a memorable event in our high school experience. 1.English Language: Earth’s Children are students from Taipei, Taiwan. Therefore, English is our second language. In this CyberFair project, we practiced using English to present our discoveries on the website. Since most of the sources are in Chinese, we have to translate them. This is a great chance for us to practice our translation skill. We are really happy that we can use English to share our finding with the world. 2. Math: In this CyberFair project, Earth’s Children incorporated mathematics skills that we learned in school. We analyzed the data from our surveys and made conclusion. 3.Science: Earth’s Children learned life science in the farming field. We better understand the relationship between soil, water and crops. We also learned about the practical but harmful effects causing by pesticides and fertilizers. We reflected upon the pros and cons bringing by the modern technologies in agriculture industry. 4.Computer Science: We designed and constructed the website for the CyberFair project. We tried to make our website with engaging user experience by adding many pictures and detailed explanations. Internet makes learning becomes more effective for modern student. With the help from Internet, we found many additional resources to help us complete the project. ?5.Art: We practiced layout the website ideas. We made posters to promote Grass Hope Taiwan Foundation and natural farming in the campus.

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Project Elements

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

In this project, we utilized many different information tools and technologies. Since one of the important features in our project is Hudi community, we interviewed many people including local farmers, teachers and students. In addition, Grass Hope Taiwan provided us many first-hand information.Then, we used our laptops to organize the information. After school, we stayed at the computer lab and made our website. In our project, Internet is the most important tool. We used Internet to search for information and store our works. Modern technologies allow us to complete the project more efficiently.

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

21st century is a fast changing world. As technologies improve, it becomes easier for passionate students to share information with the world. Through internet, Earth’s Children play the role as on-line student ambassadors of Grass Hope Taiwan Foundation. We have been promoting natural farming and food education since 2016. This includes giving presentation during school assembly time and doing Q&A sessions about the practice of natural farming and healthy diet. We hope more and more teachers and students in the campus can understand the benefits bring by natural farming. Taiwan is a beautiful country, as a Taiwanese student, we should try our best to protect the environment. For example, if we can reduce the usage of fertilizers and pesticides, farming can be very eco-friendly. We believe that even by making a really small change; it will help to preserve our beautiful homeland.

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

Taipei is the capital city of Taiwan. People live in Taipei are really busy. They often buy their daily meals at convenient store. In addition, students prefer eating junk food more than healthy food. Therefore, Earth’s Children decided to promote food education and natural farming in the campus. Last year, we cooperated with MOA Taiwan foundation. This year, we worked with local community group- Grass Hope Taiwan Foundation. This has strengthened the relationship between our school and the local community. Even if Taipei is a metropolitan, Earth’s Children still want to give our peers a chance to understand natural farming. We hope that through holding weekend food education experimental course, more and more people can enjoy the experience of growing their own crops. Through experiencing the difficulty of farming, we learned to appreciate our daily diets.

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

In this CyberFair project, Earth’s Children really appreciated the help from Grass Hope Taiwan Foundation. Grass Hope Taiwan Foundation is located in Taipei, Taiwan. It is a recently founded non-profit organization. It promotes food education and natural farming. We worked with Grass Hope Taiwan Foundation to plan for our unique natural farming experimental courses. We were so grateful to have the opportunity for witnessing the complete growing cycle of different vegetables. From seeding to harvesting, we patriated the whole process. It was a very valuable experience. After harvesting the cabbages and sweet radishes, we felt so proud of ourselves. The teachers from Grass Hope Taiwan Foundation allowed us to step out of our comfort zone. They taught us that insects in the soil were not scary. Instead, they cheered up the farming fields. We really want to spread the teaching of Grass Hope Taiwan through our project. We hope this project can help to preserve the beautiful sceneries of Taiwan and unite people to participate in events such as environmental protection.

5) Discoveries, Lessons and Surprises (Optional)

In this project, Earth’s Children made many surprising discoveries. At first, we didn't fully understand the beauty of farming. We only knew that agriculture is one of the important industries in Taiwan. After this CyberFair project, Earth’s Children began to love the feeling of being weekend farmers. We loved to watch our vegetables growing up. In addition, we also realized the benefit created by food education. We learned to appreciate the food in our bowls. This made our life more joyful.

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