Catch me if you can!

Learning mathematics outside the classroom is not enrichment, it is at the core of empowering an individuals understanding of the subject. The three activities described in this article can all be used outside the classroom in a maths lesson. Teaching mathematical concepts in this way engages and reinforces learning. It puts the ideas learnt into a setting and allows time for those ideas to be developed without any of the maths hang-ups which can occur in the classroom. By taking maths beyond the classroom, we can more clearly illustrate the connections between the real world and what they are studying in school. In so doing students and teachers alike are enthused by the wealth of resources they have all around them in their own environments. From a very young age we all play “catch me if you can!”, Tag being the most well known version, where one person chases others. When the player catches another they say “Tag, caught you, your on”. The pursuer then becomes the pursued. The 1968 classic car chase movie Bullitt, had Steve McQueen driving his Mustang GT 390 at speed through the hilly streets of San Francisco(1). This is a wonderful example of a movie car chase, but I am sure you could name others. These movies show students real life cases of pursuit. Another example is a fighter plane in battle following on a pursuit curve to shoot down a bomber aircraft. The fighter will continually point its guns and plane towards the target bomber it is trying to shoot down. As the fighter moves in, closing the gap between itself and its prey, the velocity vector will always be pointing towards the bomber