Launch Pad: Session 6, Week 2

Welcome back to Week 2, folks! This was a relatively uneventful week but we still have much to tell you.

First and foremost, today we are having our last Alpine trip for the year. While it is sad that we will be saying goodbye for now, we will surely have many more fun Alpine adventures next year, so have no fear! Launchpad learners decided to make today special by not only making s'mores but also potatoes for a sweet and savory mash-up.

In other news, Learners have continued working on creating meaningful and impactful messages to the future. We have managed to draft all four letters that will be the basis for all the revisions in the upcoming weeks. Last week we worked on “Abyss” and a “Great Victory” as previously mentioned. Now though we have also gone about “Offering Forgiveness” to ourselves when our inner critique is at its worst, and a reminder when we are “Tempted” to remain true to ourselves. To cap off the week, initial revisions for the first two letters were in order, asking Falcons to put themselves in the mindset in which these letters would mean the most, adjusting what makes little sense or fails to contribute adequately. 

On a more artistic front we have our newest drawings, starting from some of the best practice you can get, gesture drawings. Each learner found 9 poses they thought to be the most dynamic or interesting to work on. Blasting through them 3 for 10, 30, and 60 seconds each! Following this we focused on very difficult aspects like faces, feet, and hands, commonly considered to take the most practice to get down. In addition, Falcons worked with values like light and shadow, applying it practically to still live which we were tasked with arranging by ourselves!

In terms of how psychology is going though, we didn't slack off. Rather, learners had to make the tough call, what branch of psychology will they focus on in these last weeks of the year? Each one had to deliberate carefully over each branch; Behaviorism, Psychoanalysis, Humanism, Cognitive Psychology, and any others they spent time researching both this week and the one before it! While it wasn't easy, it was important as we will be presenting to you all about it at the end of this final session. In return we got the chance to do a rather interesting challenge, analyzing our own dreams for meaning, symbolism, and then connecting it back to one of three schools of thought. Overall it seemed to be great fun for all.

Accenting our week we had two topics of great interest during our Civ time. One being the Russian revolution with its protests and riots in the name of “Bread, Peace and Land!” Asking to put an end to the national food shortage, put an end to this war, and to return the land to the people. The second discussion we had though was about the Treaty of Versailles making Learners question how harsh this treaty really was. Was it successful in making an example of Germany? We even answered the following question: Are citizens ultimately responsible when a country’s military does something wrong? If not, who should be held accountable? Why?

Regardless of your opinions on the matter, I can only hope that you had a good week and that this gave you an insight into the day of your dearest Learners! See you next week parents.