Changing jobs is hard, but changing careers is nigh overwhelming insanity sprinkled with panic attacks and fever dreams.

The good news: I absolutely love what I'm doing. I couldn't be happier than I am right now, anxiety be damned. I've always wanted to teach and I'm finally doing it full-time. In fact, I've spent the last several days creating a unit to teach High School Seniors about Medieval British Literature. We're going to explore the common themes of literature during this time starting with the leaving of the Romans circa 500-600 CE, the invasions of the Anglo Saxons, the invasion of the Normans, and finally end around the time of Chaucer's pivotal Canterbury Tales.

We'll be exploring the themes of Heroism, Morality, Chivalry, Courtly Love, and Leadership as driven by the vehicles of allegory, fuedalism, the church, etc. during these middle ages. We're going to center most of this around Canterbury Tales while tying in Beowulf, The Mabinogion, Tristan and Iseult, Morte d'Arthur, etc. We'll also be using medieval inspired texts like The Lady of Shallot and even doing some work with Frame Stories using Canterbury Tales' Prologue and The Hobbit.

There will also be a decent amount of comparison of mediums as we explore the presentation of stories and characters in written text vs. film, etc. I'm especially excited about reading the first chapter of The Hobbit, then watching the Peter Jackson film for the same segment of content, and then the Rankin and Bass film for the same. Part of keeping modern high school students engaged with old, dusty literature, is bringing it back to the present and making it relatable for them as often as possible. Doing some film study, using dialectical journals for deeper analysis, and even writing our own folktales, should prove fairly popular.

All of that said, it's exhausting prepping for this. I'm new to all of it and you never really know what all goes into creating a layered unit for teenagers until you try to create a layered unit for teenagers. It's intense. I'm also incredibly excited about sharing these things that I love with them and I'm hoping my geeking out about it will bring everyone around to giving the material a chance.