Ryan Mewborn took learning to a new level as he taught his Physics students about projectile motion by making them shoot marbles across the rotunda.

Students spilt into groups, grabbed a marble launcher, and began setting them at different angles. As they watched the marbles sail through the air, they learned how the angle affects the range and height the marbles go.

After launching marbles students recorded how far the marbles went and the photo gate time when the marble left the barrel.

“The lab was a really cool and fun way to learn about projectile motions,” junior Jenna Ricker said. “It showed how launching the marble at different angles changed the range of the marble.” She said the hands-on project was much more interesting than hearing someone tell her about it.

Launching the marbles was the easy part to students but measuring how far they went was a little more diffcult.

“The hardest part was figuring out where the marble landed,” junior Austin Seamon said.

Students had to put a blank white sheet of paper under a piece carbon paper and placed it where they thought the marble would land after a launch. When the marble hit the carbon paper, it would leave a mark on the white piece of paper, so students were able to measure from the launch point to the mark on the paper.

Once all the data was recorded, students headed back to the classroom to calculate the marbles’ velocity and range to complete the lab.

“Doing labs help me because I am a visual learner,” Seamon said.

Taking physics out of the classroom and into the real world is a different way for students to learn, Ricker said.

“Labs definitely help me understand physics more because I can see why things happen, and that is a huge part of physics,” Ricker said.