CyberFair Project ID: 8620

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International Schools CyberFair Project Narrative
Title: Reappearance of tradition: Atayal weaving wisdom
Category: 8. Local Music and Art Forms
URL: http://app.kcis.ntpc.edu.tw/Cyberfair/2022cyberfair/ROT/Atayal-Weaving.html
Bibliography: http://app.kcis.ntpc.edu.tw/Cyberfair/2022cyberfair/ROT/narrative/index.html

School: Kang Chiao International School
    NewTaipeiCity, NewtaipeiCity, Taiwan

7 students, ages 13 worked together to complete this CyberFair project on March 14, 2022. They have participated in CyberFair in the following year(s): 2013-2022

Classes and Teachers: Wins Peng, Bear Shaw

E-Mail contact:

Our School's Web Site: http://www.kcis.ntpc.edu.tw

Project Overview

1. Description of Our Community

Taiwan is a small island located in the southeast of the Asian continent, west of the Pacific Ocean with rich resources. Special cultures and traditions are the most striking point in Taiwan. Indigenous people were the first group of people that settled in Taiwan, nowadays, there are 16 groups of indigenous groups left in Taiwan. The Amis, Paiwan, and Atayals made up most of Taiwan’s indigenous population. They each have different cultures due to the different physical features of their land. All groups of these indigenous people are facing the same problem, cultural loss and their traditions aren’t able to pass down to the new generation successfully.

2. Summary of Our Project

The indigenous people were the earliest people who settled in a country or land. They are divided into different nations based on their living area, and traditions. In Taiwan, there are 16 indigenous nations, and the Atayal are the ones we are going to focus on. Among the 16 others, the Atayals' distribution is the largest, covering one-third of the mountains in the middle and north of Taiwan. Like all other indigenous nations, they also have the tradition of weaving, represented by their unique patterns and meanings. At first, they weave because the technology wasn’t developed, so they need to make their daily needs by their-selves. Their technique has become great, which allows them to create their kind of art. But through time, technology is developing, people no longer need to weave by themselves. Meanwhile, this tradition is being forgotten. Few people still want to replicate their traditions due to carelessness or hassle. Yuma Taru, who wants to bring the Atayal weaving culture back to the public, is whom we are going to interview. She has started to work in this field at 29, till now, it's been almost forty years. She has always been trying to bring the weaving tradition back to life. To understand more about the distinctive weaving culture of Atayals, we are going to explore their specialized crafting mastery in this project.

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:more than 6

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

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):

Our percentage of using the internet at home is more than 80%, we often use them for research. We have 7 workstations with internet access in our classroom. Our connection speed in our classroom is 10.58mpbs, the speed of downloading is 2mpbs. We connect to the internet more than 6 times in our classroom.

4. Problems We Had To Overcome

After deciding our topic, we searched a lot of information about the Atayal weaving tradition online, including whom we can interview. We successfully found Yuma Taru, who was famous in this field, tried to contact her. We found plenty of information about her and found her email. We sent an email inviting her for the interview. We sent 3 emails to her, but she didn’t reply to any of them. To overcome this problem, we decided to call Yuma Taru. We called her based on the contact information online, but those were all found out wrong. To overcome this problem, we looked at videos and articles about her and found that she worked in Lihang studio. Therefore, we called the studio and finally were able to contact Yuma Taru.

5. Our Project Sound Bite

Participating in the international cyber fair means allowing ourselves and others to learn about a topic that is important to our community but that we rarely explore. We may learn about Taiwan and individuals who have sacrificed to make the community a better place, and we can share that information with others, allowing the tradition of action to be passed along.

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

After the process of choosing a topic, researching, interviewing, and organizing the information we get is different from the school’s original way of teaching, we learn from the procedure until we finish our course work. It was a precious experience. Teamwork had taken up a big part of our project, we were able to collaborate and work on different parts each of us is good at, and splitting jobs made the whole process of finishing the project easier. The internet provides a huge amount of information so we can ask more detailed and direct questions about the procedure and process of weaving. We also had an opportunity to interact with Yuma, the interviewee. From setting up interview questions to asking and taking notes of the answers made great memories and connections to people but not only the internet and already written information. These interactions are not found in our normal curriculum but in this competition. The surveys reflected that students and adults do not have the chance to learn about traditional weaving mastery and we were able to share the wisdom of Atayals as a learner and provide information and knowledge and reach certain standards of work and advanced tasks.

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Project Elements

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

We utilized our computer to conduct internet research in order to contact Yuma Taru for the interview, and we discovered that she works at a studio named Lihang. We used our phones and computers to call and email her to confirm the interview time. We used our computers, including 6 Macbooks and a Surface computer, to type information into Google Docs in order to prepare for the interview, and the online notebook to take notes during the interview. Yuma Taru couldn't stay longer due to time constraints, so she provided a PowerPoint slide with us for further information. During the interview, we utilized our phones' cameras to capture and edit our video with CapCut, a phone app, before uploading it to the internet. The rest of the photos were captured with our phones or cameras.

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

Students acted as ambassadors and spokespersons throughout the process. At the beginning of the project, students were able to choose a topic and explain the information they’ve got. While providing information and knowledge to the school, students, and getting information and feedback. The survey was changed a few times to get the final result they wanted and throughout speaking and conversations, they were able to decide their final results and enhance knowledge in their product. Students interviewed the master of the Atayal weaving domain, Yuma Taru, and did face-to-face interviews to get certain information. Overall the students act as ambassadors and spokespersons well and organized through the project.

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

In this project, we researched and learned the Atayal weaving tradition, and why it is important. The website we made provides an introduction and some basic information about the weaving traditions, which allows people to learn more about this tradition that is gradually being forgotten. Since the CyberFair competition isn’t only for our community, but internationally, we can promote the weaving tradition to people in the world, helping them to learn, understand, and realize the importance of reviving the tradition. Also, our interview video was edited and uploaded on youtube, it includes some important information, and ideas about the weaving tradition. Therefore, when someone sees it, they can gain knowledge from the video, and maybe even be influenced, or motivated.

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

To learn more about our topic, we need someone professional in this field to help us. Yuma Taru is a preserver and revivalist of the Atayal weaving tradition, she has worked in Liang Studio for lots of years. Her aunt, Ms.Yang, has also been helping her through her work. Ms.Yang has helped us to contact Yuma Taru for the interview, since Yuma Taru is very busy. Also, during the interview, Yuma Taru helped answer our questions, and Ms. Yang has helped to supplement more detailed information after the interview by PPT. By the introduction of Ms. Yang, we have learned more about what they did over the years to revive their weaving traditions. We are very thankful to Yuma Taru and Ms. Yang spent time helping us to learn more about the Atayal and its weaving tradition.

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