Dear Parents/Guardians,
To culminate our epidemiology unit in 8th grade science, we will be watching
Contagion (PG 13). This movie traces the path of a deadly virus as it sweeps the globe.
With no known cure for this emerging disease, death and mayhem ensues throughout
the world. Students have the opportunity to see how the topics we studied in this unit
are applied to a real world pandemic situation. The pandemic in this movie closely
reflect the Spanish Influenza pandemic of 1918. Although fictional, this movie does a
wonderful job incorporating topics we have discussed in class such as epidemics,
pandemics, direct/indirect contact, carriers, vectors, vaccines, antibiotics, symptoms,
quarantine, epidemiologists, emerging diseases, microbes (viruses, bacteria, and
protists), disease prevention, transmission and treatment, as well as ethics. With the
advancement of technology we have made amazing advances in the field of medicine.
Contagion explores the trade-offs of these advances and illustrates how restricted
rights, fabrication, and propaganda create panic and upheaval in a society.
Throughout this film, the students will have a set of questions that they will need
to answer. The answers to these will serve as their notes for a post movie writing
prompt/reflection. They will also be playing the role of the epidemiologist as they fill in a
web of who infected whom throughout the movie and note how they were infected.
While we, 8th grade science teachers, believe this movie is beneficial for your
child’s education, we wanted you to be aware that this movie does show dead bodies.
They are clothed, or in body bags and they are not gory. There is no nudity in this film;
however, there is a brief, vague conversation about a marital affair. This conversation in
the movie is important for students to hear as it pertains to one of the ways this disease
is spread from person to person. These factors in the movie are minimal next to the
amount of knowledge and application we feel the students can gain from watching the
film. If you do not want your child to watch this movie, please sign and return this sheet
to your child’s science teacher. They will have an alternate assignment for your child to
complete on Tuesday and Wednesday in class.
Sincerely,
8th grade science teachers
*** I do NOT wish for my child _______________________ (student’s name) to watch
contagion and would prefer for them to complete an alternate assignment.
___________________________________
Parent Signature
_____________________
Date