FWD [forteana] Re: The Science of SF (teaching)

From: Terry W. Colvin (fortean1@mindspring.com)
Date: Fri Aug 17 2001 - 12:53:07 MDT


Thanks for all the excellent suggestions - I knew this list would be the
best free-form brainstorm I could come up with.

One of the episodes of "The Sci-fi Files" has a rather good Science in SF
topic, plus I have it on vid

Some interesting connections :

There were a few that I thought of today at work which you folks also came
up with, like 12 Monkeys and Brazil (excellent nightmarish futures of
mindless overwhelming bureaucracies, plus a way of indoctrinating the
kiddies to Terry G). I've also thought of forcing them to read "A Sound of
Thunder" (getting them to read is like extracting teeth) as a combination
"butterfly effect" (fnarr) and time travel paradox.

Most coincidentally, after Gordon mentioned Dr Who, the best episode I
thought of was Pyramids of Mars, which several folks have independently
arrived at

I'm also thinking of surreptitiously slipping some forteana in there, with
a lesson on UFOs in the making contact section, and maybe a touch on the
Ancient Astronauts and the face on Mars. I've already got my junior
students tracking down some eye-witnesses to the Cloncurry fish falls

My biggest enemy is time (I have 12 x 70 minutes lessons to fit it into),
so most of the video stimulus material will probably find its way onto an
edited tape - specific scenes like Jump Gates from B5 (nice little red
shift/blue shift thing) along with the nicely designed Starfuries and the
Earth Alliance warships with the rotating artificial gravity sections,
Klaatu's arrival in TDTESS (as compared to the dove scene in Mars Attacks,
the opening shots from Blade Runner, something from Forbidden planet with
Robby the Robot (if just to show them a serious Lesley Neilsen), etc. Using
short cuts should avoid any problems with censorship ratings as well.

And yes, while I toyed with the idea of Bicentennial Man for about a
microsecond (only because it's a recent flick), my common sense quickly got
the better of me

thanks again - I may post my unit plan and assessment items once I get them
written

peter

wishing he had a year to teach this stuff

-- 
Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1@mindspring.com >
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