September 27, 2016, Prescott- I was handed an ad hoc lesson, on Newton’s First 3 Laws of Physics, and told to teach it, just after lunch today.  We watched two videos on the topic, one a simple cartoon and the other, a more detailed, but still well-illustrated, presentation.

Afterward, the discussion portion revealed that the students had grasped the basic points, but had not internalized the sequence of the Laws.  We arrived at the order in which the Laws are considered, by considering Cause and Effect.

Another aspect which was noted was the way that people are resistant to change, the same way that living things tend to seek familiarity and conservation of energy.  In other words,  Sir Isaac Newton viewed us as essentially lazy.

I am waiting for the first kid to cite Newton’s First Law of Physics as a reason for his/her laziness.  My answer, of course, would be that the resulting grades would be subject to the Law of Gravity.

I was struck by the way, though, that the students paid closer attention to my presentation than they often do to the lead teacher, who has herself raised the whole “WAA, WAA. WAA”, heard by the kids in the “Peanuts” series of feature-length cartoons.

It occurs to me that people rise to expectations- something Newton never addressed, but Charles Schulz did.