A CyberFair project includes research, communication, interviewing, video editing, and most importantly, website design, coding, and publishing. To do this, we need help from technology. For this project, students used 10 personal laptops to do research on Mr. Lee-Yung-Xing from online data. Search engine acts an important role in the research, Google allows us to find interview videos done by others before, Mr. Lee’s own Facebook page, to get a better understanding of our research target. Youtube is also very useful when it comes to learning new skills, before interviewing, the director gets to use Youtube videos to learn how to shoot good interview videos. Including tips like two camera angles… In addition, Google Drive, including the instant sharing function, folder creating, and supports a variety of types of documents, did a great job of helping us be organized. With the fully-functioning Google services, it makes the crewmates more connected even without being together. Google docs are the main way we store information and data. Besides, we used Google Form to collect data for later analysis. The team used Google Forms to make and send surveys. Moving on to filming the interview, we used a Canon M50 as the main camera, an iPhone 12, an iPhone 12 Pro Max as side views, and the intro is filmed by an iPhone 8 Plus. To move the video from iPhones to laptops, we uploaded them on Google Drive, where the resolution does not get zipped. For video editing and adding subtitles, the video editor uses Windows Video Editor and Arctime Pro, two easy to use free software that has enough functions the editor needs. Finally, the team used Google Web Designer to code for the website. Furthermore, used the school server to publish the website.
For a deeper understanding of the research content, the leader of the team conducted an interview with Mr. Lee Yung-Xing. According to the project leader, he uses Facebook Messenger to contact Mr. Lee, the charcoal maker accepted our request immediately. However, the interview date changed over 5 times due to Mr. Lee’s full schedule, it was finally confirmed after two weeks of coordination. One morning, the students took the school bus to Hsinchu, Baoshan Township, where Mr. Lee’s charcoal kiln is located. We acted as ambassadors as well as school representatives to organize the interview. During the interview, Mr. Lee answers the questions using his past experiences, knowledge in charcoal making and personal stories. This information helped a lot for completing the research and website. In addition, we did not get any visitors or donated services because of our contacts. However, many people are impressed with the work that we are doing including the person we are interviewing, he praised us and looked forward to our accomplishments in the future. Most of the people who are impressed are family members and school faculties. They first ask how we are doing in the project, after we show them the achievements, they show impression through facial expression, oral approbation and told us to keep doing what we are doing.
The impact of our research, CyberFair project is not limited in the community but could be spread to the society, even internationally. The project educated people about basic charcoal making information, this is an opportunity for people who may be interested in this area to discover his/ her position. We try hard to spread this information, including publishing the website, making posts on our instagrams, as well as publishing the interview we had with Mr. Lee Yung-Xing on Youtube. However, we do not think we would be discovered in a short period of time, therefore meaning the project will not influence anyone. But long term wise, we do think the effort and work we put in could help pass on the charcoal making tradition. Kang Chiao students and parents found the process of charcoal interesting, and a parent even decided to take her childs to see the unloading. A student stated: “I never noticed charcoal making is so complicated, I never really cared about how charcoal came or its existence until I used it during the moon festival (Taiwan moon festival has BBQ tradition), I feel like I should think more about how things come and appreciate them.” We showed our website, including the interview video to parents, students, and teachers, feedback is all positive. Thanks to CyberFair, it gives us a chance to introduce charcoal making, the dying traditional process and skills. By letting people interact with this knowledge, it may live longer.
Mr. Huang Guang Zhou is a former parliamentarian from Hsinchu of 2002, and he is also a close friend of Mr. Lee Yung-Xing, who we are interviewing and investigating. Mr. Huang has participated in Mr. Lee’s career for some time, he has recognized the major process of charcoal making as a third-person view. When we were interviewing Mr. Lee, he added details for the process when making charcoal, a third-person point of view for reference, and add extra information Mr. Lee had missed. Besides the interview, our school computer teacher, a former designer, design expert, also gave great help in the technical area by giving useful suggestions when we are making our website and video. Finally, we are very thankful Mr. Lee Yung-Xing moves his schedule and allows us to interview him. Throughout the interview, he talked professionally, gave creditable, easy-to-understand, and honest replies. We hope through this project we could help make this Taiwanese tradition shine bright.