CyberFair Project ID: 4798

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International Schools CyberFair Project Narrative
Title: Zeybek
Category: 8. Local Music and Art Forms
URL: http://cagdaszeybek.net
Bibliography: http://cagdaszeybek.net/bibliography.htm

School: Cagdas Egitim College
    Izmir, Ege, Turkey

3 students, ages 12,12,13 worked together to complete this CyberFair project on March 14, 2007. They have participated in CyberFair in the following year(s): 2007

Classes and Teachers: Naim Nalbant, Harun Kurt, Sim Mee Topac

E-Mail contact:

Our School's Web Site: http://www.cagdasegitim.com.tr

Project Overview

1. Description of Our Community

We live in a community largely composed of middle class people of Anatolian origin. It is typical settlement made by village people of inland settlements who are in pursuit of better life.These people move big cities with some capital on hand and attempt to break the cycle of the routines they have been in.

2. Summary of Our Project

We believe that each and every cultural and traditional dance has its own value with magnificent story behind it, so as to Zeybek, which is one of the most gorgeous dance of all time. The Zeybek dance is believed to have related so much to the lifestyle of Efes in their respective villages and towns. So, when Zeybek is performed, it actually brings us back to feel how Efes had taken the roles as heros and leaders. This dance acts out almost the exact way of life and it also projects the characteristics, gestures, habits of Efes. Nevertheless, the outrageous outfit the Efes wore at that time is also being exhibited in the dance.

In this project we intend to introduce the beauty of Zeybek and how it reflects the lifestyle of Efes from generation to generation.

3. Our Computer and Internet Access

A. Percentage of students using the Internet at home:less than 20

B. Number of workstations with Internet access in the classroom:none

C. Connection speed used in the classroom:dial-up modem

D. Number of years our classroom has been connected to the Internet:4-6

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

Since Nur is in charge of the web page, we, rest of the team members are to adapt our works to her convenience. Sometimes, we had to wait hours to get our findings appeared on our web page. As she understands the importance of her role, she tried to give us hard time just for joy/ fun/ the sake of a laugh.

4. Problems We Had To Overcome

The only hardship we face is the electricity cut-off from time to time.We have hard times to keep up with our regular studies plus project work. But thanks to our sincere attachment to our project we have always found a way to get over problem. To tell the truth luck is with us fortunately.

5. Our Project Sound Bite

For us, it means first of all to tame about our way of life. We appreciate much as long as we make you familiar with our country and our folklore. What excites us most with this engagement, on the other hand is to get a chance visiting the White House. For our parents and community, it is an exception that they regard it a progress for us to improve our English and get better understanding towards western countries.

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

Our ministry has been always keen on promoting the rich cultures of our country internationally through various types of events and programs. And to attract more students to involve in such kind of activities, the ministry usually organize suitable school curriculum to students. And this project is really considered a “big hit” to our school and also a proud to our country. Since that this is the first time ever we have been given such courage from our teachers to take up this project, we have faced quite a bit of difficulties due to lack of experience. But we are blessed that along the way, we have learned a lot of good qualities especially in terms of both self management and mood management.

We have develop a good discipline at work. After taking up this project, all of us realized that we are more alert in what we do knowing that making slight mistake may affect the whole team. Working as a team makes us better planners, decision makers and problem solvers. On the other hand, we have learned how to take criticism as a form of encouragement. It is undeniable that to produce a great project need to work under pressure especially when we couldn’t meet our high expectations. We are able to overcome stress from teachers advice. And how to take slight disappointment easily claiming that it’s a step closer to success.

Because of the fast moving life we are having now, it forces us to agree that using the internet is more efficient. Searching through the internet has made research faster and easier. It actually saves much of our time. However, we still believe that the traditional learning methods are more effective even though they need more time to produce.

During this project, we need some talks with actual people, visit them at their places and need to observe their lifestyle. We hope we can let you sense the real lifestyle of Efes and enjoy Zeybek fully/ to the fullest/ to it’s best.

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Project Elements

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

No doubt that tools and Technologies play very important role in production and presentation. They are essentials. They have made our job so much faster and easier.

For photos and videos, we have used a video camera, a camera and a scanner. We then saved them into 3 computers. With the help from some computer softwares like Photoshop, Frontpage, Corel Draw, Macromedia Flash, Video Editor, we were able to produce better effects and re-touching on them. We also use the video camera for oral interviews. Telephone is used to do call-ups. As for the contexts, we scout from one place to another for information of Zeybeks. We even hired some books for research purposes. The final was to combine all the resources and again, computers are used to produce our website with lots of interesting photos, videos with lots of informative contexts of Zeybeks.

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

We have all agreed that to act as “ ambassadors”, we are to be good communicators. Our goal was to find ways on how to be able to send our messages( the ideas of our project) to the public. The fact that we intended to travel and get hold of real people for Efes and Zeybek dance performances, we followed the hard way instead going through existing web pages which only provide touristic information with many adaptations. On our tours to town and villages, we approached local people. We would like them to sense that we value them highly and we were there to peruse the realities. For then, it was a starting experience to see us there in person for research of Zeybek.

Besides that, we also thought that word-of-mouth may also do the same trick. Therefore, we had made a public presentation during the Parents Meeting in our school. It was really a terrific experience for all of us. Talking to people from different levels had boost up our confident especially Selin, who used to be the “shy girl” in the team.

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

Throughout the process of doing the project, the feedback was so welcoming. This is also mainly related to our friendly culture where people like to help each other. Moreover, in such a meaningful and wonderful project. We remembered that whenever w ego for an interview, people would tend to come forward and they simply wanted to know what we were doing. Furthermore, when we have a scene to take, the street would be crowded as though a superstar was there. We were surprised to see public voluntereed to dance Zeybek on the street! We even got telephone calls from parents who offered to give us support and most remarkably to visit our school and enjoy some folklore musics.

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

As mentioned earlier on, Zeybek is actually a dance which project the characteristics of Efes, who had lived for the past three hundred years ago. Therefore, talking to older people regarding this matter helped us a lot. We have tried to find families from Efe background. And we have successfully found a few of them, the Efes third generations. One of our classmates, Simay have volunteered to call his father for this matter. Her great grandfather used to be Efe. We had an interview with him and he had contributed a lot of useful information to us. We are so grateful for his help. We are also very lucky to have a chance to do an interview with Dr. Mehmet, whose grandfather was also an Efe. In fact, one of the most famous Efes at that time. It was just a coincidence how we had found him. It was through one of our English teachers. He happen to be our teacher’s dentist. Dr. Mehmet has given us such valuable resources and belongings of his grandfather. We would like to thank him for his kind help. We are particularly lucky that our coach Mr. Naim is from Kutahya province where Simav and Nasa are where the current Efes are located.

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View our CyberFair Project (Project ID: 4798)

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