Ed Tech 4 Science

Much as we may try to deny it, we teachers have known this truth for years:  we’re boring.  Oh, we fight back gamely, but in a world of television and movies, music and video games, capturing students’ attention is a real challenge.  A decade or two ago, the problem was bad enough, but now!  Now there are iPods!  Now students have music, games, and videos on their cell phones!  What chance do we, poor teachers have?

Two years ago, I decided to try an experiment with my Physics class.  I decided to fight fire with fire.  If the kids want movies, let’s watch movies.  And I don’t mean those “educational videos”; I mean real, blockbuster Hollywood movies.  No one ever accused Vin Diesel of being boring.  No one ever accused Arnold Schwarzenegger of being an old stick in the mud.  No one ever accused Keanu Reeves of droning on and on in a monotone…um, yeah… 

Speaking of Keanu Reeves, the classic example of bad movie physics is the delightfully improbable Speed, with its climactic scene of a city bus jumping across a 50-foot section of missing freeway.  The kids know that such a thing could never happen, but when they work through the calculations to show that it couldn’t, they really gain a better understanding of why it doesn’t work.  For an extension activity, students can calculate how large a take-off angle the bus would need in order to make it across.  It’s not as large as one might think (or it wouldn’t be if one could ignore air resistance the way we so often do in introductory physics courses).

I recently completed Superhero Week, in which I had my class analyze scenes from Superman, Superman Returns, Batman, Batman Begins, and Spider-Man, looking for examples of directors playing fast and loose with the laws of physics.  Just to cite a few examples from the first of the Christopher Reeve Superman movies, Superman meets Lois on her rooftop and takes her out flying.  Why doesn’t she freeze?  How can she breathe at that altitude?  How come she can fly as long as she’s in contact with Superman, even when it’s just their fingertips touching?  When their hands come apart, why does she plummet straight down, rather than following the normal parabolic path of a projectile?  When Superman catches her, after many seconds of free-fall, how does she survive the impulse?  Shouldn’t she at least have a few broken ribs?  Bruises?

In the interests of honesty and full disclosure, I should admit that I did not arrive at the idea on my own.  A long-time fan of science fiction and fantasy novels, I first thought of using that avenue to generate interest, but as I searched for resources online (why reinvent the wheel, after all?) I stumbled across a fabulous website:  Intuitor’s Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics, now also available in book form.

As I dug further, I turned up even more resources:  Bad Movie Physics: A Report Card, and 9 Laws of Physics That Don’t Apply in Hollywood. And then there’s my personal favorite (yes, I know; as good as Intuitor is, I think this one might be even better), a book called Don’t Try This at Home! The Physics of Hollywood Movies, by Adam Weiner.  My first year of doing this, I pretty much stuck with the suggestions from Intuitor and Adam Weiner.  Then, as I gained more confidence, I began searching out my own for movies to use.  Once you start looking, they aren’t hard to find.

Guest Posting by Jon Nauert 

LHS Physics and 9th Grade Science Teacher
LHS Tech. Rep./ Basmati Administrator
Lakewood School District Technology Trainer 

This entry was posted on Friday, January 16th, 2009 at 1:21 pm and is filed under High School Science, Middle School Science, physics, Science Activities, science education, science instruction.You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.