F1 Fanatic

My suggestion would be go for it, no matter what anyone says – as I especially don’t get any arguments that say, well, if they’re not already interested in it, then they won’t be. Whut? The whole point of school is to get you interested in things you would never have heard of otherwise – and the fact that that’s not a fundamental underlying principle of education says a lot about our western societies… ahem, I think I’ve digressed.

If your passion for whatever subject you talk about comes through in your teaching, your students will be interested, and as long as you push them to think, ask questions, and most of all to not just accept what you tell them but begin to figure things out for themselves – I think that the chosen topic can be more or less anything you want it to be. And Senna certainly carries enough emotional punch (the person, not the movie; haven’t seen) to get anyone interested.

As a 17 year old Australian in High school, I hope I can help..

I only started watching F1, like Herman, in 2008 and beforehand I had no idea, let alone much interest, in who Senna was. Quite frankly unless the students are interested in F1 or motorsport in general most wouldn’t make any connection with the movie. To most of my friends, F1 is just ‘Cars going around in circles’ and the only good bits are the crashes.

For the film to have an impact on people I think first you should do a lesson, even just 10-15 minutes before watching the movie, showing YouTube videos of classic F1 moments. Show some crashes, classic battles, the kinds of things that get 14-15 year olds interested and then find a way to relate it to Senna and the topic.

One of the things I find with teachers is this..

Teachers that the students can relate to and respect will be given time to explain their point and the students will listen, taking what they are saying and teaching in, while those that don’t respect the students are barely given the light of day and the message that they are trying to teach is largely ignored.

My Physics teacher is a classic example of the former. In class we do barely any work, he talks to us, not at us, and we watch Youtube videos (Duck Song anyone.. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtN1YnoL46Q ) and class is generally fun and the students respect him. However when he goes to teach us something, the whole class is silent and we take in every word that comes out of his mouth and we learn a great deal. Compare this to other teachers and the difference is unreal.

If the students can relate to you and respect you like this then they would watch just about any movie you put on for them. If they don’t, Good Luck!!

*Another video we watched for those nerdy enough.. The Electromagnetic Spectrum Song.. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjOGNVH3D4Y

PM. We (me and my 10 yr old) saw it on the relase day in the UK (3 June). It maintained his attention for 2 hrs (he likes F1 but keeping him still for 2 hrs is a challenge!). It’s a 12A in the UK which means only for under 12′s if with an adult and their consent. The accident scenes are not too graphic – the worst is actuallt not Senna’s but Martin Donnelly’s from 1990 where he is thrown from the car and his broken legs are very obvious. His reaction after the film might offer an idea for how you’d handle a lesson – which I think would be a great idea BTW. He is obviously too young to know anything about Senna and had never heard of Prost and the rest, but having wathched the film he had formed very strong opionions about the different characters based on how they were portrayed i.e. Senna the wronged hero, Prost the villain and with all the political influence with the FIA, Ballestre the biased administrator out to get Senna in favour of Prost etc.

So, how about a theme of the objectivity vs subjectivity of Biographies. You could argue that a biog ought to be impartial and objective but are they? Get them to watch the film and then discuss (and write an essay) on how the characters are portrayed based on the evidence of the film. It is a documentary with real footage and quotes so everyting is “fact”, but the writer/director can still influence the viewer. It would actually be an advantage for them to have little prior knowledge since their views would be based entirely on the portrayals in the film e.g. some might see Senna as heroic, wronged, victimised, others might see him as paranoid, reckless etc. Plus you get to watch the film!!!