THIRD-GRADERS TO LEARN ‘THE SCIENCE THAT STAR WARS GOT WRONG’
March 14, 2000
Contact Ross West (541) 346-2060
"The Star Wars movies are great entertainment, but less than accurate in some areas of science," says University of Oregon physics instructor Dean Livelybrooks. On Tuesday, March 14, he’ll be using the films’ appeal to third graders at Eugene’s Willagillespie Elementary School to teach the children about science. For example, when the films show a starship exploding, the blast is accompanied by the theater-shaking sound of the explosion. "But sound is a wave carried through a medium such as air or water, and space is a vacuum, so there is no sound," Livelybrooks says. "We will be demonstrating how sound isn’t propagated through a vacuum." The elementary school class also will learn what sound looks like, and how organ pipes pick out certain sounds to amplify. Third grader Dylan Garrett, a member of the Willagillespie class, who has studied science with Livelybrooks in a mentoring program since the fall, will assist Livelybrooks. SOURCE: Dean Livelybrooks, instructor, UO Department of Physics, (541) 346-5855.
NOTE: The event will take place at Willagillespie Elementary School, 1125 Willagillespie Rd. Livelybrooks and Garrett will set up their presentation beginning at 1:20 p.m.; the classroom presentation will last from 1:35—2:35 p.m. For authorization to be on the school grounds, members of the media MUST go to the school’s main office to obtain a visitor badge. Directions to Gretchen Merton’s classroom can be obtained at that time.
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