A disadvantage does not necessarily prevent us from achieving our goals.

Moses mentions his personal impediments that could be obstacles in carrying out the mission. God encourages Moses to take the mission despite the disadvantage, and Moses accepts the mission and goes out to the people, who receive the message and believe in it. The fact that Moses is tongue-tied and stutters is a disadvantage. Moses is afraid that the recipients of the mission will not hear or accept his words. This impediment teaches Moses to trust in God as the source of his speech, and to use his brother Aaron for help.

Story
Relato
Histoire
2
| Unit
| Unidad
| Unité
3

A Mission! Despite the Refusal

Exodus 4: 10-17, 21-31

In this lesson, we will discuss the meaning of God's choice of Moses as a leader – as a person who has a disadvantage in what appears to be a central strength required to carry out the mission. We will learn different ways of understanding the expression “tongue-tied and stutters,” and we will see what God commands him to do, in order to continue his mission despite this disadvantage. From learning about the essence of Moses' impediment, we develop empathy and awareness to impediments of human beings. We will delve into the advantage that the leader chosen for the mission was purposely not perfect. We will suggest that important lessons can be learned precisely from the fact that God chose Moses as a leader, despite being “tongue-tied and stuttering.”

El éxodo de Egipto. Mapa con explicaciones

Unit Knowledge Goals

Objetivos de conocimiento en la enseñanza de la unidad

Objectifs pédagogiques de cette unité

Learning interpretations of Moses' being "tongue-tied and stuttering."

Learning God's response to Moses' claim.

Pédagogie

Pedagogy

Pedagogía

Teaching Practices
Pratiques pédagogiques
Aconsejamos enseñar esta unidad a través de la siguiente práctica pedagógica
Havruta
Check out
SEL
Aprendizaje social y emocional
ASE

Self-awareness. Identification of strengths and weaknesses. Empowering positive self-concept and self-confidence.

 

Self awareness: recognizing and reflecting on strengths and weaknesses, enhancing positive perceptions of self efficacy and confidence.

Background for Teaching the Unit

Contexto de la unidad didáctica

Résumé de l’unité et valeurs centrales

In the previous lessons we delved into the story of God's revelation at the Burning Bush. God assigns Moses with the mission of bringing the Israelites out of Egypt and to the land of Canaan. In the dialogue between God and Moses we saw various arguments posed by Moses regarding his unfitness for the mission. After God gives him three signs that will help convince the people of the truth of the revelation (the staff that turns into a snake and into a staff again, the hand that becomes leprous and is healed, and the water that turns into blood), Moses raises another personal argument, according to which he is not suitable for the position.

Moses claims that he is not suitable for the position because of a disadvantage that he has: "I have never been a man of words," an argument which Moses continues to describe and in which he points out the flaw he has in his speech: "tongue-tied and stuttering.” In this unit we will seek to gain a greater understanding of the meaning of the disadvantage presented by Moses at the Burning Bush (Exo. 4:10-17) and which he repeats later after he has already gone on a mission to Pharaoh and claims that he is "me—who gets tongue-tied" (6:12).

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…"הֲלֹא אַהֲרֹן אָחִיךָ הַלֵּוִי יָדַעְתִּי כִּי-דַבֵּר יְדַבֵּר הוּא
וְגַם הִנֵּה-הוּא יֹצֵא לִקְרָאתֶךָ וְרָאֲךָ וְשָׂמַח בְּלִבּוֹ"

“… There is your brother Aaron the Levite.
He, I know, speaks readily.
Even now he is setting out to meet you,
and he will be happy to see you"

Activité d’introduction
Actividad de apertura
Opening Activity

What strengths does the leader have?

Activity – Viewing and Discussion

We will watch a section of the movie “The King’s Speech” (2010)

Background on the movie: The movie tells the story of a leader who had difficulty speaking and speaking before his subordinates and had to go through a long process of learning. The movie is “The King's Speech” (2010), which is based on a true story, describing the story of the British King George VI (father of the former Queen of England) who stuttered, and his relationship with the (very unorthodox) speech therapist, Lionel Logue who helped him overcome it. Before he was (reluctantly) crowned as George VI, Albert was just a prince, the Duke of York, who never imagined he would ever be the king (his older brother was actually the heir to the throne). Especially in light of the fact that he suffered from a speech impediment and stage fright, as well as lacking trust of those around him to be king.

In the section we watched, Albert, Duke of York, is asked by his father, King George V, to deliver a royal speech that would be broadcast on the radio.

Following the viewing, the students will answer the questions on the viewing card King's Speech.

Students will be able to fill in the page in pairs or groups.

Discussion in plenary

Following the viewing, we will ask the students to share the plenary with a new insight into leadership.

We will finish this stage with a survey question - We will present the claim that “rhetoric is the leader's main strength”

We will ask the students to work in pairs and write their opinion about this statement on paper, and then hang it on the walls of the classroom.

We will give the students stickers in three colors and ask them to attach a blue sticker to the statement they agree with, a red sticker to the statement they disagree with and a green sticker to the statement they are undecided about.

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Étude de l’histoire
Aprendiendo la historia
Learning the Story
Verses
Versets
Versículos
-

2:3:EN:2:1

 Reading Verses - Reading Theater

Following the questions that arose while watching the movie about the ability of a leader with a speaking impediment to perform his role, is it even appropriate to have a leader with such an impediment? We will continue to study the story of Moses, while considering these questions.

We will study chapters 4:10-17 and 6:10-12 using a reading theater. A reading theater is a pedagogical tool and the students will reveal the meaning of the verses while reading them. The students will read the text in the way they understand its meaning.

 We will divide the students into groups for reading, after we explain the idea to them. We will ask each student to be assigned to one of the roles – announcer A, announcer B, choir, director/performance manager, audience.

The reading theater task for students Reading theater.

What is Moses' difficulty? What exactly is he afraid of?

We begin by re-reading chapters 4:10 and 6:12.

It seems that Moses is a witness for himself - 

“I have never been a man of words, either in times past or now that You have spoken to Your servant; I am slow of speech and slow of tongue.” 

“The Israelites would not listen to me; how then should Pharaoh heed me, me—who gets tongue-tied!” 

We saw in the verses three phrases related to speech: 

Slow of speech

Slow of tongue

Tongue tied 

We will ask – what does this mean? How can this affect Moses? Why is this an obstacle for him?

Hevruta – Moses' Difficulty

In the Hevruta, the students will study worksheet Moses' Difficulty. The goal is to discover the nature of Moses' difficulty, and to discuss his ability to accept the mission despite the difficulty he faces. We will also see how the story ends – Moses is helped by God's words, turns to the Israelites and they accept the message and believe it.

In the plenary session, we will review together the various answers that God gives to Moses, following his presentation of his difficulties to accepting the mission. We will emphasize – God gives different solutions, but what they all have in common is that the answer to Moses' concerns and doubts is in God's hands.

There is a fundamental statement here about the redemption of the Israelites from Egypt and the nature of God's leadership. On the one hand, the Israelites will be able to get out of the difficult situation they are in only with God's help and guidance. On the other hand, we see along the way that human involvement is also required.

*In the revision of the study page, we will mention: 

• When God speaks to Moses there is an emphasis that the speech is of divine origin and therefore the external aspect of speaking is negligible. God also gives a specific answer to solve the difficulties raised by Moses (such as, Aaron will act as a speaker).

• The following question on the worksheet can be repeated in the plenary and involve a joint discussion:

In light of the study of the various commentators, what would you say to Moses in response to his claim " I have never been a man of words"?

Is it a problem if the leader has a problem?

After dealing with Moses' speech, we will discuss the following questions:

1. Can a leader at Moses' level have a speech impediment?

2. Can a leader have any impediment or impediment?

3. What can be learned from the fact that God does not give in to Moses, and guides him on ways to carry out the mission, despite Moses' claim about being “slow of speech and slow of tongue”? And what can be learned from the fact that He purposely chose Moses?

We will emphasize the fact that God wants Moses to perform his duty despite his speech impediment. From this we learn the message that the power of speech and, in general, all of a person's abilities, depend on God. We can also learn from this that every person (despite their impediments), will be able to do what is assigned to them and fulfill their mission in the world, with the help of faith, tools, support and guidance.

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Extended lesson on sibling relationships, following the story of Moses and Aaron
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Résumé
Resumen
Summary

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Summary for the teacher
Profundización para el docente
Approfondissement pour l’enseignant
Summary for the teacher s2 u3
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Student Activity - Plenary Discussion

We will return to the Israelites in Egypt, and to Moses who is about to take on a difficult and complex mission.

1. We will ask - what does Moses learn from God's responses?

2. Check-Out!

The students will discover what they have learned from these verses in relation to their own world. Attached activity What do I take with me?

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Para tu desarrollo
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Summary for the teacher
Profundización para el docente
Approfondissement pour l’enseignant
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