Learning card

League of mutants

Description

Based on the students’ previous experience about stories like Justice League and X-Men, the aim is to develop a debate about the ethical and evaluative dimensions of daily life in today's society. At the same time, the exercise aims for students to gain an understanding about significant factors of the availability of access to and use of information and how social representations are formed at present.

As a language resource we propose creating mashups of characters and their stories, favouring the confrontation between powers and the use of literary and narrative resources in general as options for the formation of values. Likewise, an exercise like this allows social contexts and problems of the community to be addressed or the student's context based on a critical use of information.

Tag
  • Comic
  • Movies
Skills

NARRATIVE AND AESTHETIC

  • Interpret
  • Recognize and describe
  • Evaluate and reflect
  • Apply

IDEOLOGY AND ETHICS

  • Recognize and describe
  • Evaluate and reflect
  • Apply
Learning areas
  • Language
  • Social Sciences
Card language
  • Spanish
  • English

Structure

Sessions
2 (Variable)
Duration
90' (Variable)
Number of participants
10-30
Age
  • 14-16
  • 17-18
Materials
  • Newspapers
  • Magazines with images of national celebrities
  • Cartoons, comic strips, images of superheroes
  • glue
  • Sheets of paper
  • Markers
  • Stickers or stickers with emoji icons

Process

Key questions
  • Has anyone seen the Batman or Superman movies? Can you tell me a little about the story of these characters?
  • Why do they fight against the enemies of the city and fight their problems? Where did they get their powers? Are they really that strong? Any questions? Are they worried about their own lives?
  • It is expected that in this section some stories will emerge around the superhero characters and their values, their powers will be defined and even the relationship between good and evil will be debated.
  • With some realism and without falling into fiction, can we think of a kind of superhero that would be good for our own situation? What kind of problems could they solve?
Development

For the development of the activity the group is divided into subgroups of four members. Based on a social problem of the current world or of the context itself, leaving the discussion with the group, half of the groups work on the design of a "superhero" and the other half on that of an anti-hero. For the design the groups cut faces, bodies, spaces or atmospheres from landscapes, words, phrases or objects out of the magazines to make the superhero, which are composed of real elements as well as fictional elements.

The group creates a story about the origin of the superhero, their name, the adventures they have had and their ways of acting. The superhero can also have a piece of music, sound or musical rhythm that identifies them.

Once the superheroes have been defined, the teacher starts a story based on a problematic situation and calls one of the anti-heroes or superheroes that have been created. The teacher can then call on the other heroes to participate as the story progresses. The key of the activity is that the teacher proposes limit situations according to what happens in the story and students develop possible solutions to the dilemmas based on the powers of their characters.

Example of the dilemmas would be:

  • In an extreme situation the hero must decide between saving their opponent or saving the community. Why do they make this decision?
  • What does the superhero do if they realize that they are the cause of a problem that they are fighting?
  • If by a superior force the superhero or antihero loses their powers to come to face an extreme situation.

During these discussions and in the presence of each of the characters, the groups should take advantage of emoji stickers to give assessments of the behaviours and decisions of the heroes and anti-heroes.

Evaluation

The evaluation of the exercise focuses on the debate about the dilemmas, challenges and decisions in everyday life and the way in which the stories can help to give us a perspective on what happens in the context of ethical decision. Equally works on the coherence and the powers that emerge from the values ​​that are put into play in a story.

References for professors

  • Marvel Comics. X-Men.

    DC Comics. Justice League.

Author

G. Eduardo Gutiérrez. Pontificia Universidad Javeriana (Colombia), gilberto.gutierrez@javeriana.co.edu

  • Comic
  • Movies