Forget
adaptive learning. Toss out gamification and videos. Who needs lecture podcasts
or any other educational techno-tool intended to help students learn better? If
you want young people of any age to master academic concepts, you should head
to a galaxy far, far away.
Star Wars may provide everything that
instructors need to illustrate their lesson plans. Using elements from the
famed movie franchise, instructors can construct mathematics problems, explore
scientific ideas, or explain literary themes. The Star Wars in the Classroom
site offers ideas and resources for incorporating Luke, Leia, Han, and the gang
in teaching.
Two
professors, one at the University of Auckland in Australia and the other at the
University of Central Florida College of Medicine, wrote a series of papers for
Academic Psychiatry recommending that
university faculty use the behavior of Star
Wars characters to demonstrate psychiatric principles.
“For
instance, Luke Skywalker’s moody behavior in the original 1977 film Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope (not
doing chores, hanging out in bars, animal cruelty when ‘bullseyeing womp rats’
on his home planet) might be analyzed by students when talking about
manifestations of teenage depression,” said a report by Times Higher Education.
Luke also
suffers from Oedipal issues as the result of treatment by his “deadbeat absentee
father,” Darth Vader, who in turn exhibits borderline personality disorder and
post-traumatic stress disorder. C3PO has obsessive-compulsive personality
disorder and Obi-Wan Kenobi displays symptoms of major depression and
pseudo-dementia.
The idea is
that a cultural phenomenon like Star Wars
might hold students’ attention more than traditional textbook content and
provide examples of concepts that are easier to understand and retain, helping
to awaken the force of learning.
