School: SJK (C) Choong Wen
    Kuala Lumpur, W.P, Malaysia

15 students, ages from 11 to 12 worked together to complete this CyberFair project on March 30, 2002. They have participated in CyberFair in the following year(s): 2001

Classes and Teachers: Ms Goh Siew Wah, Ms Chong Yin Wan

E-Mail contact:

Our School's Web Site: http://www.choongwen.edu.my

1. Description of Our Community

Our community refers to our school community. We have 2053 students, 42 classrooms and 2 computer labs. Our school is nearby a residential area and some shops. Most of the students are not from a rich family background, but their parents are very enthusiastic in helping the schools development by donating money to school and organizing charity activities.

2. Summary of Our Project

We decided to make a core project on Business and Community Organizations. The community organizations are the Board of Governor, Parents and Teachers Association, Alumni Society, Headmaster, teachers and students. Firstly, the project introduces our education system and smart school. We would like to introduce how the local community helps to build our school, the activities that they had organize to collect donation. We started our project by end of January. With the helps from our coaches, we performed many researches on the title using various sources, which includes online searching on the Internet, newspapers, magazines, books and others. In order to have a better understanding the Board of Governor, Parents and Teachers Association, Alumni Society, we had an interview session with them. We feel very happy because we learn many from this project, such as, we learn how to collaborative to each other and we know that there are many people are caring our school.

3. Our Computer and Internet Access

A. Percentage of students using the Internet at home:21-50%

B. Number of workstations with Internet access in the classroom:4-6

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

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

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

The school has two computer lab consists of 100 networked PCs, a joint effort between the school and TMEduTech (M) Sdn Bhd, a local company which helps the school to implement the Smart School concepts strongly encouraged by the government. TMEduTech stationed the computer teachers and managed the lab for our school. As the IT co-ordinator for the school, they help the school to obtain the sponsorship from the local ISP company, MIMOS Berhad with a 64kbps leased line under Smart Learning Education Program. Our dedicated computer teachers, headmaster, PTA (Parent Teacher Association) members and the MIMOS officer in-charged, Mr Kim Ng have always encouraged us to participate in any collaborative projects. Our computer lessons emphasize on project-based activities, as they believes in the teaching, which leads to help the students to earn a life-long learning skills.

4. Problems We Had To Overcome

Language – Our school is Chinese primary school with Mandarin as the main communication language. We faced language difficulties when conducting interview with the education officers. Usually, we used to write in Mandarin and our computer teachers helps use to translate to English. We used many methods to improve our English. We flip through the dictionary and the Chinese to English software to write our content. We also seek help from our computer teachers, parents, brothers and sisters.

Internet Searching and Interpretation Skills – We faced problem in searching information that is related to smart school and the history of the local community because there are few web sites that provide such information.

Time – We start our project on the end of January, and there is school holiday on February, we face the problem of limited time. Due to this reason we cannot interview other schools, furthermore, we don’t have the transport to go to others school. So, we do the planning first, we follow the schedule to do our project. But we do our best, and we feel very happy we can finish our project in the short period.

Interviewing – We faced the problem of making appointment with our Board of Governor, Parents and Teachers Association, Alumni Society, Headmaster because they are very busy with their works. Luckily, they still some times to talk to us and this helps us to complete our project. But we still feel very regret that we cannot interview some of them.

5. Our Project Sound Bite

The whole project is so meaningful to the students as it helps them to realize the importance of English language, reading and writing skills to express their thoughts. The students also realized how important it is to enhance their general knowledge. As for the school community, it helps to make them realized that the students need more participation and exposure to expand their talents especially in technology side. These project also let students know that there are many people whom are very enthusiastic or warm-hearted to help their school to become better and better.

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

In our school, computer lesson is one of the core subjects in our syllabus. This computer lesson is project-based, which emphasize on smart learning approach. The project-based activities involve a research and presentation. The 6-year lesson consists of 12 levels. We learn MS FrontPage in level 12. After completion of the project, the students has to come up to present the projects done. Through the participation of the CyberFair project, we have gained a hand-on experience in constructing a web site includes the homepage designing skill. These can help us to do better in our future school projects.

As the normal school syllabus only allows us to learn things theoretically from textbook. We seldom use Internet to look for more information other than the textbook. So we found that there is much more resourceful information can be found on Internet. We cannot fully depend on our textbook only. We also realized that we could go to the Internet for more information if the textbook is not descriptive enough.

From this project, we also learned many interviewing skills, we learn how to communicate with other and we also learned how to do the research in different way which is cannot learn from class room. Besides, we learn many new software in short period, we feel very happy. The software are Microsoft Image Composer, Microsoft GIF Animator, Flash 4.0 and Anfy 1.4.5. The We found the Anfy 1.4.5 program in Internet, and the program is freeware, we feel very happy because the program is user-friendly and we can make our web site more attractive.

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

Information tools and technologies that we used to complete our CyberFair project are as follow:

Hardware Intel Pentium multimedia computer – To process our data (15 machine) Cannon and Mustek 1200ED Scanner – To scan photos into the electronic format Digital camera – To capture photo during the talks and interviews Laser and color printer- to print out the information found from the Internet for our reference and understanding. Telephone – To contact our team members and our teachers Leased Line as our Internet setup

Software Chinese Star 2.97 (Chinese – English Dictionary) – To look for the new English vocabulary (very important tools to us) Internet Explorer version 5 – Use to browse our homepage, browses Internet web sites Ms Front Page – To build the our homepage Paint Shop Pro 5 – To edit pictures and photos Ms Image Composer – To edit photos and design titles Ms Paint – To draw pictures Ms GIF Animator – To design the animated button and picture Macromedia Flash – To draw pictures and create simple animation Ms Word – To word processing stuffs CuteFTP - To upload our homepage to the server Anfy 1.4.5 – To design the banner and ultimate the web page design Internet Access (Email) – To send file to our teacher, our team members when necessary

Oral Interview PTA President – Mr. Shum Yew Choong PTA Vice Presidents – Mr. Tan Men Choon, Director – Mr. Lim Lian Seng Alumni Society – Mr. Wong Yoon Hee, Mr. Yeoh San Choy Teachers – Madam Pang Mooi, Madam Ng Chew Leng, Madam Chong Paik Choo, Madam Tan Swee Neo, Madam Ng Mei Kuan, Madam Lim Kit Hong, Mr. Lim Kwee Chai All the interviewees provide important information which can help us to complete our project.

Paper Interview Parents of Standard 6s, 6j, 5s, 5r, 4s, 4e, 3s The survey form is use to gather the opinion of parents about the

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

The students have acted as the ambassadors in this project by arranging the talks and interviews through email, teacher, phone calls and letter. They also help to increase the awareness of the three main organizations that help to develop the school. Our PTA president Mr. Shum Yew Choong and vice president, Mr Tan Men Choon is very helpful and support us to do project. They are very kind-hearted person, since they were afraid we couldn’t write down all the points that they had told us, they suggest us to use the sound recorder, but unfortunately we did not prepare. After that, they wrote all the important point to us. We feel very grateful about it. Besides, we also do survey from some parents about their opinion of “Smart School Project” by using survey form. Headmaster and teachers are also very helpful after know the students want to do the project, they provide many useful information.

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

The completion of the CyberFair project enables fellow students to know there are many people are care about the Chinese education, they are not rich but they warm-hearted in raising fund to help the school to become better. The school still need the full support from all the community because the number of students are increase yearly then the school need to have a new building to let more students have opportunity to study the Chinese education. Students must appreciate all the people that even help school. The web site can let more people and the worlds to know what is our school still need help not only in financial but also in mental in order to achieve the smart school goal. This project also give an overview of Smart School project, actually there are many people in our community do not know what is Smart School project. From this project, people will more understand what is smart school.

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

We would also like to express our appreciation to our school PIBG presidents, principal, teachers and parents because they accept our interview and provide important information to help us finish our project. Our computer teachers who guide us through out the whole project. They provide us with the technical support in both hardware and software aspects, teaching us how to use Front Page to build homepage, cheer us up with strong encouragement.

Our parents who spent time to fetch us to school during this CyberFair project.

Our classmates also helped us in gathering information, giving ideas wherever appropriate.

Last but not least, we would like to thank for ourselves (all the team members) for staying together until we completed the project.

5) Discoveries, Lessons and Surprises (Optional)

The actual learning experience in project-based activities is so useful. We found that a good team spirit is so important to make a project successful. Although sometime we have argument in designing our project, but at last we learn how to make a commitment between each and other. Integrating technology into the learning process can make the lesson more effective, fun and enjoyable. The feeling of achievement is so great if we always try until the very last minute instead of give up half ways. From this project, we know that they are many people are very caring of our school, this make me feel that we have responsibilities to become a good students, we must study hardworking. And after we grow up, we will also want to contribute our strength to help our school become better and better.