National Biomechanics Day Event Report #5 - Maggie Wagner

12/16/2024 1:00 pm

Maggie Wagner and the University of Pennsylvania’s Human Motion Lab hosted an NBD event for female-identifying high school students that they called “Just Biomechanics!” They used the dance game “Just Dance” to provide a framework for discussing a variety of interesting biomechanics topics. Using the video game, students danced to their favorite songs and used a markerless motion capture system to track their movements with a skeleton overlay. From this, they described how muscle structure and function enable movement (like dance!) and showed off the different instruments that are used for data collection.

 

Maggie described the event as “enthusiastic and comfortable” – students had a great time dancing and, when not on stage, were excited to learn about all the things the lab has to offer. Some favorite songs were “Rasputin,” “Barbie Girl,” and a few K-pop tracks.

 

Maggie looks forward to hosting more events like this in the future and recommends “thinking about ways to connect your research to a hands-on activity. Getting students moving, starting a friendly competition, or teaching them how to use or test a research instrument are all fantastic ways to keep them engaged and evoke interest. I would also advise structuring the event to include a Q&A session with volunteer graduate students. Our high school students were very appreciative of the advice and time of our amazing volunteers.”

 

Here are some fun photos of the day!