Tag Archives: good

Discussion Plan: Part-Whole relationships (Good).

Discussion Plan: Part whole relations

  1. Can a person be a good person if they make mistakes?
  2. Can every feature of someone’s face be beautiful without their face being beautiful?
  3. Can every act someone does be good without the person being good?
  4. Can a thief be a good person?
  5. If you share something that is good with someone else, does that mean you are left with half as much ‘goodness’ (can you think of examples and counter examples?)
  6. Does a good person have to be good all the time?
  7. How do you decide whether something is good?
  8. Can a good toy be good even if it no longer works?
  9. If having one slice of cake is good, is having 4 slices going to be 4 times as good?
  10. Can a team be a good team when one of the players is not a good player?
  11. Can all the players in a team be good players, but the team be a bad team?

 

Discussion Plan: ‘Good’ and ‘Very good’

Discussion Plan:   ‘Good’ and ‘Very good’

  1. What is the difference between getting a ‘good’ mark and a ‘very good mark’
  2. What is the difference between having a ‘good’ day and having a ‘very good’ day
  3. Would you always choose something that is ‘very good’ over something that is ‘good’
  4. What makes something ‘very good’ – is it just more good (good x2) ?
  5. Can something be ‘very good’ to the point where it is bad?
  6. Is ‘perfect’ the extreme limit of ‘good’ (going from good to very good to perfect)?
  7. Is it possible that if something has the potential to be good, it also has the potential to be very good? Is it always the case? (give examples/ counterexamples)

 

Activity: ‘Good’ and ‘Very good’

Activity:   ‘Good’ and ‘Very good’

Give out slips of paper with the following sentence – ask everyone to complete it

Collect the slips and put them in a hat – each student pulls one out and reads it

The class has to discuss it and decide if (or under what circumstances) it would be true.

 While ____  is good, ____ is very good.

 

This could also lend itself well to short skits. After reading out all the statements and discussing them, the class could vote on the four or five most interesting ones. Then small groups of 3-4 students could make a skit out of a particular statement.

Discussion Plan: Good Acts

Are these acts good in themselves? Or are they good  because  the outcome after doing them is good?

  1.   Getting a high mark in a test
  2.   Cleaning up your room
  3.   Cheering up a friend who is sad
  4.    Looking after your younger brother or sister
  5.    Looking after yourself
  6.    Sleeping soundly (getting a good night’s sleep?)
  7.    Helping someone when your asked, but not enjoying it
  8.    Keeping a promise
  9.    Solving a riddle
  10.    Smiling
  11.    Telling the truth
  12.    Not telling the truth in order to protect someone’s feelings
  13.   Refraining from  Teasing someone

Discussion Plan: Recognizing and Judging what is good.

Discussion Plan: Recognizing and Judging something as ‘good’

Which of these things are good? Which might be good? (and on what criteria?)

  •       A plane that is very safe in the air
  •      A pen that writes very nicely
  •      A gun that shoots very accurately
  •      A gun that doesn’t shoot accurately
  •      A warm blanket in winter
  •      A broken sewing machine
  •      A broken toy
  •      A warm blanket in summer
  •      A haircut
  •      An expensive painting
  •      A table that is old and scratched but is just the right height to sit at comfortably

Discussion Plan: on ‘Good’

Discussion Plan: ‘Good’

1) Can something be good, but not be perfect?

2) Can something be good but unpleasant?

3) If something is perfect, is it always good?

4) Is a perfect lie a good lie?

5) Is it good to tell a perfect lie?

6) Do you think you can decide if something is good by looking at it?

7) Can you decide whether people are good by looking at them?

8) Do you think the world is a good world?

Note for educators about the intertextual activity on ‘טוב’

 Note for Educators:

N.B. This could also be organized for students by putting each of these passages on a card and writing the translations of ‘tov’ from different English translations on the back of the card. First the students look at the passage and think about it themselves, then turn the card over and see the way ‘tov’ has been translated across different translators. Some examples are:

Translations found in English translation of the Bible

2:9:       good

2:18:     right

6:2        Fair, beautiful

15:15    ripe

16:6      right, appropriate

Leading Idea: What is ‘good’

Download pdf    Leading Idea:   What is ‘good’  (“וירא אלהים כי-טוב“)

 

The term ‘good’ is a valuative term; to use it is to judge something in positive light. While the term ‘good’ is often used in moral discourse (e.g.; what it means to be a ‘good person’), not all uses of the term point to ethical judgments – for instance, we often say of our food: “this is good!”, or someone might refer to their car as ‘a good car’. So there are moral and non-moral valuations of the word ‘good’, both in the Tanach and in the students’ daily lives.

We find the term ‘good’ woven throughout this first account of creation. What does it mean in this context? When the text says: “וירא אלהים כי-טוב” ( ‘And God saw that it was good” ) what kind of valuative judgment is being made?  Indeed a number of issues concerning valuations might emerge through reading the text. We might list these as the following:

  1. What is the meaning of the word ‘Good’ ?
  2. What is involved in recognizing something as being good
  3. “God Saw that it was good” – This involves both seeing something (being aware of it) and judging it.
  4. What is the difference between saying something is ‘good’ and saying it is ‘very good’?    Can there be different degrees of good? (v’s. 4,10,12,18, 21,25, to v.31, 5.
  5. There is also the issue of part-whole relations – what is the difference between judging each part of something good and judging the whole thing as good? (also     particularly relevant to Day 6.)

Because the phrase”וירא אלהים כי-טוב”   repeats itself several times in the text, there is an opportunity here to explore a different angle on each occasion. This would help develop a thicker and more textured appreciation of the meaning of the text overall.

Each of these issues and distinctions are explored in the exercises and discussion plans below.

Induction piece: As an induction piece we suggest sections A and B in the first discussion plan “Exploring different meanings of ‘good’” as it opens up the range of meanings ‘good’ carries in everyday life. Each of these give a very different reading to the act of creation. (Section C could come later, after the reading before or during their inquiry).