With multiple ways of thinking about quadratic functions and their multitudes of shapes, I'd like to talk about something similar to the soccer ball idea. I like to think about hitting a golf ball high into the sky when we begin talking in class about these large arcs. The sad part is that the flight path of a golf ball is not in the shape of a parabola nor does it stay in one plane. I would like to discuss the actual flight of a golf ball from a mathematical stand point. Looking on from the side, a ball flies in a parabola like path. it takes off and goes up and up and up until it reaches a point where the spinning of the ball ca no longer keep the ball rising. the spin rate becomes too low to keep the ball aloft. it then takes a much steeper descent downward towards the ground. In a sense, from the side, a golf ball seems to fly in the shape of a lop-sided parabola. The next issue is that because of the spinning of the ball, it can also move to the third dimension. Looking from behind where the ball takes off, the ball can move left and right, too. In a sense, you could hit a ball that is like a lop-sided parabola from the side, but now it can tilt away from you or towards you! say you had an x-y-z coordinate plane. then you would be able to graph the flight of a golf ball because of its dimensional properties. So, i guess i just wanted to explore that idea. that to graph the flight of a golf ball, with spin, you would need a three dimensional plane.