2005 International Cyberfair Project

ÿBuilding a Kids Heaven in Our Communityÿ

Happy Kids Weekend, a Celebration of Faith, Hope, and Love

Project Overview

1. Description of Our Community

      We live near the Taipei City government building, this is a very prosperous area and has convenient transportation like the Taipei MRT and Sung-San Train Station.  The Taipei East Christian Church (TECC) is located near the center of this area and about 10 minutes away from our school.  The "Happy Kids Weekend" (HKW) community service was initiated by TECC in August 1998, this service provides children an environment filled with love and rejoicing.  To live in here, the volunteer teachers have designed quality children activities and provide kids a place where they can relax and grow up.  Therefore, we call "Happy Kids Weekend" a place of "Happy Kids Heaven".

      In Cyberfair 2005's topic "Prepare and Unite", we show how community service is a place to help kids unite their soul with Faith, Rejoicing, Hope, and Love.  It's just like "Happy Kids Heaven".  Children are just like the seed to the future, through their involvement, they, their family and the community will enter into a prosperous future.

Location of Taipei East Christian Church

2. Summary of Our Project

      On the east side of Taipei city, there is a group of warm hearted volunteers, they work hard for the kids and teenagers, giving them a place filled with love to grow up in.  Through creative activities , games, and dramas, they help the kids in the community grow in a place of faith, rejoicing, hope, and love.  We are encouraged by what they have done here, and we wish that through our interview and presentation on the internet, we can showcase the love of the Happy Kid Weekend to the public, so others also be inspired to build a kids heaven in their local community.

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: 45

C. Connection speed used in the classroom: 10/100M connection

D. Number of years our classroom has been connected to the Internet: 5-7

E. Additional comments concerning your computer and/or Internet access (Optional): Teachers and students use MSN to have net discussions and use the FTP site to share our documentation.

4. Problems We Had To Overcome

A. Limited time: Most of us have study or hobby classes after school, it's hard to gather all of us, so we rescheduled our time to solve this problem.

B. New member didn't have sufficient experience: In the beginning our schedule was delayed for this reason.  When we spent time teaching the new member, then our schedule started to catch up.

C. Unclear or insufficient data: When we went to the street to interview other kids about their feelings concerning happiness, lots of kids had answers that were not clear, we proceeded to ask more kids to increase the amount of data.

D. It was hard to finalize the web structure: In the beginning, we built the project structure too big and found lots of the data was hard to acquire or we didn't have sufficient information, so we reorganized our structure and made it more realistic and achievable.

E. Didn't have good skill on the computer: Because we are still learning, we are not mature in all skills.  Therefore, our teachers worked with us one on one and let us absorb the experience from other Cyberfair projects.

F. Too many pictures: We had too many pictures, and not all could be used.  Therefore, we divided them into different categories and selected the important ones we really needed.

G. Group spirit not enough: In the beginning, we preferred not taking certain jobs, so some jobs became the ones that no body wanted to do.  Later, we learned we needed to be united and willing to take the responsibility to do them.

H. Our writing ability wasn't good:  We were often hindered in writing, so we tried to layout the key points and reorganized them, and then discuss them.  Finally, we asked parents and teachers to rephrase or check our writing.  After this, we think we should spend more effort in writing to have good progress.

5. Our Project Sound Bite:

A. Only when we actually participated in the activity, did we really know what was inside.

B. If we don't have love and share in our heart, we will not feel what true love is and share it. For this, we spent over 6 months and then we started to realize and grow up in this field.

C. If we only care about ourselves, and not willing to do more, the group work will not progress.

D. Only through actual interviewing and surveying, we started to understand the deeper story.

E. To join an activity is one thing, to participate in the activity preparation is another thing.  We found it will need lots of effort.

F. To complete this Cyberfair project was not that easy, it was not just making a web page, the work was so huge and bigger than our imagination.  When we felt our job easy, it was because we had just taken an easy part.  When we do more, we found we need to know much more.

G. Project problem solving was hard, after solving one another come.  We started to understand "Unite will Bring Power".

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

A. "Building a Kids Heaven in Our Community" Cyberfair Project enabled students to learn about the communities near their school.  It expanded their learning and helped them understand the progress and development of local community.  Through the incorporation of school, community, and family sources, we learned and worked together to conduct this project.

B. It enabled student to experience and explore the community, to know the service groups in the community and the change and impact of the culture in the community.

C. From interaction in the project, students realized what the volunteers had done for the community, and by taking action, they learned how to care and help other people.

D. Students learned how to correctly use information tools.  They also learned some practical tools and computer applications, like media processes, documentation, camera, video and audio recording.  Internet lets us break the limitation of space, and expands our learning.

E. Through participation in this project, the students learned how to accept each other, prepared them to be patient and merciful, and taught them the importance of group incorporation.  We believe these will become their most precious experiences - to conduct the project by real experience and to feel the heart of the volunteers by on-site participation.

F. Students realized the value of life, that the content of community service should not be evaluated from outside, and you need to participate to find out the motivation - "Power of Love".

G. This project challenged their potential.  The research scale is greater than what they had learned in their school, like organized writing, ability of conduct research, combined application, interactive relationships, computer applications, building a web site, and multimedia procession.  Maybe students did not do things perfectly, but the result of a "kids style" web project, we believe, will make them more touched and inspired to learn more.

This Cyberfair project broadened our eye and learning,

challenged our limitation and let us found our insufficient part!