TI turns Hollywood magic into real-world lessons

08/13

The "STEM Behind Hollywood" education program is designed to get middle and high school students excited about science, technology, engineering and math by demonstrating the real-world concepts behind four popular Hollywood themes: zombies, space, superheroes and forensics. Watch video

There's a lot more to Hollywood magic than smoke and mirrors. Popular movies and TV shows about zombies, superheroes, spaceships and true crime come to life only because of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM). That's why TI is launching "STEM Behind Hollywood," a new education program designed to get middle and high school students excited about STEM.

The program offers a series of free online classroom activities available at www.stemhollywood.com that help teachers demonstrate the real-world concepts behind four popular Hollywood themes: zombies, space, superheroes and forensics.

Each activity can be downloaded to the TI-NspireTM CX graphing calculator, Student Software or TI-Nspire™ Apps for iPad®, allowing students to visualize and interact directly with sci-fi-influenced representations of the math and science to gain a deeper understanding of the real-world concepts.

The program was developed with help from actress Mayim Bialik and the Science & Entertainment Exchange, a program of the National Academy of Sciences.

"We are helping teachers draw young people into STEM by showing the 'cool factor' of real-life science and math behind the magic they see in movies and on TV," said Melendy Lovett, president of TI's Education Technology group. "We are very excited to work with The Science & Entertainment Exchange and our STEM education brand ambassador Mayim Bialik on this initiative to capture students' imaginations and cultivate a lifelong interest in STEM subjects and careers."

These activities were developed with the help of scientists and experts from The Science & Entertainment Exchange who consult on Hollywood films and TV shows to ensure the accuracy of science and mathematics depicted on screen. And Bialik, an Emmy-nominated actress portraying a scientist on The Big Bang Theory and a scientist in real life, helps students make the connection between what they see on screen and real concepts.

"The Science and Entertainment Exchange is a nonprofit outreach of the National Academy of Sciences that brings scientists and entertainers together to make the movie magic as realistic as possible," said Rick Loverd, program director of The Science & Entertainment Exchange.

"When entertainers have questions about anything from robotics to physics to genetics as they're making feature films, TV and videogames, we'll bring in field experts who can help them develop whole worlds and characters and stories with real science behind them. One of our goals of this effort is to inspire the next generation of kids into STEM careers, and Texas Instruments' approach to getting kids engaged in math and science by using Hollywood as an entry point, it's really exciting."

Zombies In the first activity, Zombies, Bialik teams up with Steven C. Schlozman, Ph.D, Harvard Medical School professor and renowned author of "The Zombie Autopsies: Secret Notebooks from the Apocalypse," to help students explore several real-life scenarios of math and science – including what factors would impact the outbreak and spread of a "zombie pandemic," much like the plot of the summer's blockbuster film World War Z, and what a "zombie brain" teaches about a real, healthy human brain's functions.

"It's important to know zombies aren't real but that doesn't mean we can't think out loud in the classroom about what makes them sick and have teachable moments with students on epidemiology and neurology," Dr. Schlozman said. "This first activity takes scary, real-life scenarios like avian flu or Ebola outbreaks and turns it into something we can talk about and have some fun with, while still learning and exploring some very serious science concepts." In addition to Zombies, "STEM Behind Hollywood" activities will feature themes of Space, Superheroes and Forensics with the help of noted field experts, including:

•Space: Dr. Randii R. Wessen, Senior Technical Staff member at the Jet Propulsion Lab (JPL) Innovation Foundry.

•Superheroes: Jim Kakalios, Ph.D, University of Minnesota professor, author of The Physics of Superheroes, and Exchange consultant for Watchmenand Green Lantern.

• Forensics: Diane L. France, Ph.D., D-ABFA, Forensic Anthropologist and Director of the Human Identification Laboratory of Colorado.

Visit www.stemhollywood.com to learn more about the "STEM Behind Hollywood" program, access the free activities, and sign up to receive notifications when new activities are available. A free trial of TI-Nspire CX computer software is available for students and teachers to use with the activities.