Article
Publication Date
January 2017
Journal/Book Title/Conference
APS News
Volume
26
Issue
1
Abstract
For me, skateboarding became the vehicle that lead to my success in education. In fact, the skills I learned in skateboarding, such as practice, creativity, discipline, persistence and setting goals, later made me successful in school. For young people, by knowing the terms, they can in effect learn more, when they can see practical applications in their own lives. My inspiration for choosing skateboarding to teach physics came from my work with middle school students who were not interested in the topics of science class until I showed how much of physics, such as forces and motion, were found in things they did regularly -- such as skateboarding. So, this idea that there was a lot of physics in skateboarding led me to coin the phrase Action Science. It has the action of action sports, and has the science of motion, forces, Newton’s Laws of Motion and simple machines.