Fall Saturday SAVY, Week 3, Superhero Psychology: How Heroes and Villains Think and Feel (3rd-4th)
Hi there, amazing, fantastic, incredible, astonishing, and uncanny people!
We were both happy and sad to welcome everyone back for the last week of the course. It has been a fantastic 3 weeks filled with lots of learning and fun!
To start, we wanted to give students the opportunity to show off just how much they have learned during the 3 weeks of class, so we went back to the good, old Jeopardy game to play a new version that discussed everything we taught them. Students were put into groups with their fellow classmates, and everyone did a wonderful job collaborating to try and get the most points.
After a successful round of Jeopardy, we discussed the requirements for the final project that students would be working on after lunch. This project involved students finding a character who was a “deep cut” or a comic book character who had not been prominently featured in a movie in the last 20 years to do a psychological analysis on.
Then, we engaged students in a conversation about how comic book characters have been portrayed in the media and popular culture. We watched videos about how certain characters’ psychological journeys have been portrayed across movies, TV shows, and animated cartoons. This allowed us to dive deep into ideas like identity, how origin stories influence character perception, and the ways in which experiences change how superheroes handle various situations.
After lunch, students were given the opportunity to go to the computer lab and start researching different comic book characters from DC and Marvel that they could pick for their final project. We had students choose characters like Kitty Pryde, Zatanna, Blue Marvel, Ultron, and Darkhawk (ask your student who they chose!). From there, students dug into the research to find out their character’s origin story, powers, and any super teams they have belonged to.
Once students picked their characters, we headed back to the classroom for them to create a poster that discussed their chosen characters and the ways in which they found connections between their characters and what they learned in class. Students thoughtfully considered what archetype their character would belong to, what their superpowers revealed about their internal desires, and whether the id, ego, or superego was what dominated their personality, among other connections.
Students concluded the class by presenting their posters, as well as receiving praise and applause from all of us for a job well done!
As I said above, it has been wonderful getting to see the students learn and grow during the past 3 weeks of class. They have thrived with the challenging course material and excelled across all activities and projects. I hope they had a wonderful time becoming superhero psychologists and thank them for their dedication and amazing contributions!