Hero's Journey:
Curriculum Outline
Curriculum Outline
Unit One: Ritual & Rite of Passage
Unit Goals
-
Introduce the concept of transformation as the foundation for understanding the journey pattern
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Introduce the three-stage process of transformation, using the rite of passage as a model
-
Introduce the death-and-rebirth metaphor and symbols associated with transformation
-
Make students aware of points of passage and markers in their own lives, and to explore the importance of markers
Material Covered
-
Ritual and Rite of Passage (handout)
-
For in-depth discussion: Ritual and
the Creation of Meaning -
Film: The Air Up There (a good film
for this unit as it has both a hero's journey and a rite of passage) -
Blackfoot legend: The Buffalo Dance
Activities
-
Discussion: Teenagers and Modern Rites of Passage
-
Questions for review
-
Create your own ritual for a modern "life transition"
Unit Two: The Hero's Journey
Unit goals
-
Introduce the pattern of the hero's journey using an eight-stage generic model that can be applied to myth, literature and life
-
Introduce the key events in the journey process and the significance of those events in growth and transformation
-
Provide students with a heuristic for understanding, analyzing and relating to literature and film
Material Covered
-
The Hero's Journey: outline and explanation of the stages and their relationships to literature and life (handout)
-
Film: Star Wars―A New Hope (you may use virtually any film to teach the journey)
- A history of research and analysis into the heroic journey pattern, including sections on the Jungian heroic archetype and Joseph Campbell's monomyth.
Activities
- Anticipation Guide: What makes a hero?
- Discussion: Athletes, actors and actresses, and victims as
heroes
- Elements of the Journey: note taking, discussion and film
Unit Three: Gawain and the Green Knight
Unit goals
- Introduce students to the concept that the challenges we face in our journeys almost always reflect our own needs, fears and weaknesses
- Students study a well-known legend to explore the journey pattern in literature
- Give students a basic model to practice applying the journey pattern to understanding and analyzing literature
- Introduce students to the importance of symbol and metaphor in the journey model
Material Covered
- The Legend of Gawain and the Green Knight (handout)
Activities
- Lecture (or reading): Background materials on "Gawain, King
Arthur, the Round Table"
- Log Gawain's Journey (activity)
- Understanding the Nature of the Challenge (study questions)
- Interpreting stages of the Journey (discussion)
Unit Four: The End of Eternal Spring
Unit goals
- Introduce the theme that quests usually have both physical and mental components
- Explore the role of compromise as part of taking individual journeys in a shared world
- Introduce the theme of openness or permeability and its importance in our journeys
Material Covered
- Myth: The End of Eternal Spring (handout)―a retelling of the myth of Demeter and Persephone
Activities
- Quests and the importance of compromise (discussion)
- Mythology based vocabulary
- Demeter's and Persephone's compromise (discussion and
reflection)
- Writing about compromise (short reflective essay)
Unit Five: The Legend of the Buddha
Unit goals
- Continue to study the journey pattern using one of the most famous quest stories in history
- Introduce the spiritual, including the call to spiritual growth or transcendence and the return with a spiritual gift
- Explore in more depth the symbols and metaphors associated with the journey process
- Introduce the Buddhist concept of detachment or letting go and how it relates to growth in the journey
Material Covered
- "The Legend of Buddha" (handout)
- Film: The Little Buddha (optional)
- For in-depth discussion: Buddhist Non-Attachment and the Hero's Journey (NEW)
Activities
- Understanding mythological motifs, archetypes and metaphors
(discussion)
- Historical context: The Axial Age
- The Message of the Return, sacrifice and responsibility
(discussion and reflection)
- Understanding Buddha's journey (review questions)
- Analyzing The Little Buddha: Tibetan Buddhism, reincarnation, death as a journey, the father's journey (discussion)
Unit Six: Film Unit (Field of Dreams)
Unit goals
- Students use journey pattern to study and analyze a film
- Introduced stories with several characters on journeys
- Show students see our roles shift as we interact with others in their journeys and they interact with us in ours
- Use the journey heuristic to write a character analysis
Material Covered
- Field of Dreams (film) or another film (basic approach to using film is covered using Field of Dreams)
Activities
- Group collaboration: note taking, analysis and presentation
- How our Journeys interlock (discussion and reflection)
- Log Ray Kinsella's Journey (activity)
- Understanding transformation: charting a characters growth
- Character analysis (major essay)
Unit Seven: Hero's Journey Short Story
Unit goals
- Give students an opportunity to apply their knowledge of the journey pattern to write a short story of their own
- Introduce through the context of the journey plot, character and conflict development
- Provide students with an enjoyable activity that will takes them through all of the stages of writing, reviewing, editing and polishing a finished work
Material Covered
- Step-by-step directions for writing your own short story
based on the journey pattern (handout)
- Directions for using short stories or films (from your own curriculum)
Activities
- Write your own short story using the Hero's Journey pattern
as a foundation
- Inventing and developing character, building setting and
creating conflict (exercises from text)
- Sentence modeling exercises for describing scenes and
writing dialogue (from text)
- Peer response editing (forms in text)
Unit Eight: The Call Refused
Unit goals
- Introduce students to the consequences of rejecting the call (i.e., a rejection of the natural process of growth)
- Present the call refused and the "too-late" revelation as an example of the downfall of the tragic hero in literature
- Explore the concept that the need that triggered the call doesn't go away when one ignores the call
Material Covered
- The Call Refused: What happens when we reject the call to
adventure (handout)
- Groundhog Day (film)
- The Myth of Minos and the Minotaur (handout)
Activities
- "What if...?" (How would the lives of heroes differed if
they had refused their calls?) (discussion)
- Understanding the need for accepting your calls: Groundhog
Day discussion
- Analyzing Groundhog Day (review questions from text)
- Understanding how refusing your call affects others
(discussion of Minos myth)
- Writing about a call you refused (short, informal essay)
Unit Nine: Hero's Journey Presentation
Unit goals
- Give students the opportunity to explore mythological heroes from various cultures of their choice (emphasis on non-Greek and non-Roman myths)
- Students better learn the journey process by teaching it to the class with a group presentation of their selected myth
- Students evaluate themselves and their peers using a rubric
Material Covered
- Group activity: research non-Greek/non-Roman myths for a
class presentation (instructions in workbook)
- Non-Greek/non-Roman myths (from your curriculum or library)
Activities
- Find a non-Greek/non-Roman heroic myth (student research
activity)|
- Group collaboration, rehearsal and presentation of the myth
(group activity)
- "A Member of the Team" (group and individual self-evaluation)
Unit Ten: My Journey―Personal Mandala
and Autobiographical Essay
Unit goals
- Students begin to explore explore their individual journeys by creating a personal mandala
- Through the creation of the mandala, students deepen their understanding of symbolism and how it is expressed in life and literature
- Introduce the journey as a process of psychological growth
- With the mandala process, students learn an alternative mode for exploring and analyzing literature and characters
- Students use journey heuristic as tool for self-reflection and autobiographical writing
Material Covered
- Personal mandala pre-writing exercise (from teacher's
manual) including two NEW pages on the philosophy of the mandala
and using mandalas in the classroom.
- Directions for autobiographical essay writing project
Activities
- Using the mandala as a window to self-discovery (discussion )
- Using the mandala to analyze charcters from literautre and
film (discussion and activities)
- Revealing self through symbol and metaphor (discussion)
- Finding the shadow self: personal qualities chart (activity)
- Creating your own mandala (activity)
- Writing a reflective essay about a heroic journey you have taken
Use this link to order the curriculum.