Robert at Casting Out Nines just posted a Fall Preview. It’s nice to know what our fellow bloggers are doing so we can pick their brains or follow along when they write about instruction. This is what I have going on this semester:
- A daughter starting high school (yikes!), a daughter starting second grade, and a son starting kindergarten. The two younger children are on the autism spectrum (my daughter has Asperger’s and my son is currently diagnosed as developmentally delayed).
- A new course entitled The Hero with a Thousand Faces, a senior elective in which students will analyze literature and a couple of films based on Joseph Campbell’s theory of the monomyth.
- 11th grade college prep British Literature and Composition (a chronological study of British literature)
- 11th grade college prep 2 British Literature and Composition (also chronological, but at a different pace and depth and with some different reading selections, mainly the novels, but others will differ as well)
- 9th grade college prep 2 Grammar, Composition, and Literature, which is our 9th grade English course, including The Odyssey and Romeo and Juliet. Our focus is on grammar and writing.
- Department Chair of our English department.
- National Honor Society Adviser.
- Returning to school to begin my masters in Curriculum and Instruction with an Instructional Technology focus.
Good luck and I look forward to reading your blog about your experiences this fall!
That Cambell class sounds amazing! I'd love to hear what books and films you'll be using. I try to focus our mythology and Odyssey units in that direction.
I'd also be interested to hear if you have any pointers on the two 9th grade texts you mentioned – my 9th graders generally hated both the Odyssey and R&J.
Looking forward to reading more!
You must be super-woman. I don't know how you juggle all those hats! I completed my masters in curriculum and instructional technology about three years ago–very stressful but tremendous growth I experienced as a teacher.
Hope your school year goes well.
Thanks, Tammy.
Hurt, we are starting with The Iliad, but will also read things like Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, The Hobbit, The Ramayana, and we will definitely watch Star Wars (4-6).
As for Romeo and Juliet and The Odyssey, I just can't understand how students would hate them. I don't think I've ever had entire classes that hated them (although I'm sure I've had individual students who did because you just can't please everyone). Try searching through my archives — I have stuff for both. I also have a lot of stuff at the UbD Educators' wiki: http://ubdeducators.wikispaces.com/DanaUbDPlans.
Lisa, the closer I get to starting it all, the more I feel like stupid-woman rather than super-woman, but thanks. I am really nervous about making all this work.
Hey Dana,
Sounds like you've got a full plate! But it also sounds like you're well prepared, despite the opening day jitters.
Another thought you may consider adding to your many topics for "Hero with a Thousand Faces": comic books. Many are taken directly or indirectly from mythology (Thor, Oracle, Hercules, Wonder Woman), others are recycled images from folklore (Green Arrow and Hawkeye are new versions of Robin Hood); Batman can be looked at as a sort of modern-day Odysseus, and Superman is both a modern Hercules, and the recurring dream of power and immortality. The various animal-related characters (like Spider-Man, Batman, and Catwoman) can be related to the Egyptian half-man deities (in fact, Hawkman, in his original incarnation was related to Anubis, the hawk-god).
It makes a good argument for the permanence of mythology, and the way that literature is a revolving and returning set of stories about the human condition.