Halloween falls perfectly with Ms. Lowry’s catapult project in physics as she prepares by buying candy pumpkins to have a Halloween theme in her lesson. She expects her students to have a great time with the project as they do it every year and enjoy it. Ms. Lowry also goes in-depth on the importance of the catapult project and how she makes it enjoyable for her students.

“We are teaching projectiles which fall in line with Halloween so the candy pumpkins were perfect, and students got to eat them, on top of being easy to find,” Ms. Lowry said.

Ms. Lowry loves all of her physics projects as they get the class to be more interactive. 

“It’s like children; I can’t have favorites. I love everything we do in this class,” Ms. Lowry said.

The project’s importance results in teaching projectiles and how the students can see a visual of how the catapults launch the pumpkins across the room and calculate the projectile.

“We are required by law to teach projectiles, but because of how it lands it’s perfect for Halloween and it’s easy to time with the lesson we’re learning,” Ms. Lowry said.

The catapult project benefits students because a projectile is a missile meant to be fired or launched, so they can understand it in a fun way.

“Of course it does and they can again, see the projectile and see how high the pumpkins go,” Ms. Lowry said.

Students love having thrilling projects in physics and it brings out participation in the classroom. Junior Sammy Pina enjoys the different experiments and projects students are able to participate in physics.

“Yes because it (project) was the easiest one and there was a lot of creativity and fun,” Pina said. “We got to eat candy, the day was laid back, and allowed for the class to have a fun day.”