Who stays in the air longer: Olympic skater Irina Slutskaya during a triple Axel or a LeBron James dunking a ball?

In Ohio State Professor Michael Lisa’s General Education physics class, “The Physics of Sports,” students learn about forces and reactions by watching videos of athletes, followed by Professor Lisa’s explanation of the actions. Using two projectors—one for the video and one for calculations of forces—Lisa shows students how the jumps, sprints, twists, and turns of sports are accomplished by athletes. Dr. Lisa explains: “I'll do a freeze-frame on [the] videos and we'll see the time on any given frame. We can analyze the space and the time frame by frame and then do a small analysis of this on the iPad. It takes a lot of organization and preparation but it works very well.”

While the use of tablets and dual projectors could enhance many classes, Lisa feels a disciplinary affinity for it: “As physicists, we will tend to automatically draw inclined planes and blocks, and we say, 'Well, this is like a ski slope and that's like a skier.' Simple drawings lead to simplistic treatments, and it's much more compelling for the students if they see an actual athlete, especially one that they know, perhaps an OSU player, and we can analyze that photo, not my poor drawing or stick figure of the photo. It's a way to make it more compelling."

For more about how Dr. Lisa uses tablets to teach, watch his ASCTech YouTube video

If you’re interested in learning more about how you could achieve your learning objectives with technology, please contact ASCTech.

And, for the samples analyzed during class, LeBron James has longer hangtime.