Aim: How can we evaluate Odysseus’s leadership through his decision-making in his encounter with “Scylla and Charybdis” in Homer’s Odysseus?
Do now: Would you sacrifice one person in order to save five other people? This question introduced us to the trolley problem which we watched a video on. The video introduced us to the Trolley problem where they gave us two scenarios of situations in which you had to choose the lesser of two evils which can be very stressful and change depending on different people. They also describe how the trolley problem is kind of similar to an experience to see if moral decisions are based on outcomes or the way you achieve them. There was another thought that the scenarios shouldn’t really matter, the only thing that mattered was the consequences, or the outcomes, because the greater the amount of people you saved the better.
After finishing the video, we then did a Kahoot on different scenarios that Ms. Peterson created and had to make choices to see what we would do in the situation. One of the questions was on one side of the railroad there are five normal workers, on the other side there is someone who was about to become a surgeon. Who would you save? I saved the surgeon and so did the majority of my classmates. Our class discussed that sure, in the present 5 lives would have been lost, but if the surgeon survives, in the future even more lives would be saved, you could have saved more than 5 people. If the 5 workers were all pregnant women, would you kill one and save the 5? This one was pretty reasonable to save the 5 pregnant women since there could be technically 10 or more people as they were either pregnant with one or even multiple children. Another question was if one side has 5 criminals and the other side has one worker, who would you save? Again, the majority of the class chose the same thing, we all chose to save the one innocent worker since the criminals could have ruined a bunch of lives already. The last question was if the one worker was your best friend, would you still save them? At first I was going to choose to save my friend since I knew them and would have a connection with them so I wouldn’t want to disappoint them or their family, but then I had a small voice in my head telling me that it could have been a bit selfish. Sure the one worker was your best friend but what about the other 5 innocent lives? They could have been someone else's best friend that you caused to die. It would not be fair that 5 lives were lost due to personal connections. I used different points of views in this scenario and yet I still felt guilty trying to make a decision.
Spirit Reading
After the Kahoot activity, we did spirit reading which we read about Odysseus and his encounter with Scylla and Charybdis. Scylla was a nymph and daughter of Phorcys. She rejected Glaucus, a man who was in love with her, so Glaucus with a broken heart went to Circes to tell her his story. Circes tried to win Glaucus’s love with her words, but he rejected her. In anger, instead of hurting Glaucus, Circes decides to punish Scylla by turning her into a hideous monster who had six heads. Scylla was unable to move and each of her heads would seize someone from the crew. On the other hand Charybdis was also a nymph but daughter of Poseidon. After stealing a cattle from Hercules, Zeus punished Charybdis by turning her into a monster who spits out water that could cause a threat or completely wipe out passing ships.
After getting introduced to both Scylla and Charybdis we did spirit reading on the story of Odysseus how he faced the challenge of Scylla or Charybdis.
Summary of the reading:
After leaving the sirens Odysseus had to make a choice to go the path that had Scylla as their obstacle or the path that had Charybdis as their obstacle. Odysseus tried to cheer his men up and tell them that they already went through a lot, so what is wrong with one more memory? He makes his decision to go to Scylla without telling his men anything so that they would keep their hopes up and finish their tasks without backing out. He thinks about the advice that Circes gave, which was that he should pick Scylla since she would only kill 6 of his men whereas picking Charybdis would risk his whole crew. Odysseus then asks if it was possible to go through Charybdis and then kill Scylla but Circes quickly brushes off that thought and mentions that Scylla is immortal. Later on 6 of Odysseus’ men get eaten and the rest of the crew survive.
Whole Class Discussion
Odysseus is faced with the challenge of bringing his men through two dangerous places. Why does he choose one over the other?
Our class said that he picked Scylla because she would only take 6 of his men and the rest will survive. On the other hand if they went to Charybdis, they would be risking all their lives. Many people agreed and thought that Odysseus made the right choice. Then we mentioned how this story connects to the trolley problem we did at the beginning of today's lesson. Odysseus had a choice to sacrifice a few and save the rest or risk the whole crew which is similar to the trolly scenarios.
Allusions
After finishing the Scylla and Charybdis part of the Odyssey we did spirit reading and learned more about allusions. Allusions in literature are used when writers/authors mention a part/scene/or expression that references another work of literature. We see allusions in many different things like songs or television shows. For example this illustration from the Simpsons has an allusion. This illustration references the book and movie series Harry Potter.
We also then talked about idioms and how they had a small connection to the topics we talked about today. For example the idioms, “between a rock and a hard place” and “to choose the lesser of the two evils” both can describe someone who is stuck between two decisions that aren’t 100% good or bad so they have to choose one of them.
Teamwork
Finally, after reading about allusions we answered some questions.
Imagine your one of Odysseus’s men when he leads his crew to Scylla.
How do you feel about his position to take you closer to Scylla?
Do you support his decision or not?
Our group said that if we were his crewmates and knew what Scylla was capable of, we would definitely feel worried since we could be one of the six unlucky people that get picked by Scylla but it would definitely be less scary than knowing that we were going to Charybdis since we have a chance of surviving. I said that I would support his decision since we should try to save as many people as we can and this would be the right choice.
2. Also Odysseus decides it would be best to not tell his men what route they were taking
a. Would you have wanted to know which route Odysseus was leading you to? Why or why not?
b. If you were the leader, would you have made the same decision?
c. Why might Odysseus have opted to withhold this information from his men?
My group said that they would rather not know what route Odysseus would take them to so that they can keep the little bit of hope of survival and it would be scary knowing that you were going to die. In my opinion I thought that I wanted to know what route to take since I wanted to prepare myself and be ready for whatever was about to happen. We then all agreed that if we were Odysseus we would have made the same decision since that meant more people would have survived. For the last question we said that he might not have wanted to tell them the information because if they knew that they might die in either of these choices they might be selfish and not cooperate as well since humans are selfish naturally and would want to survive.
Reflection
I thought that this lesson was one of the easier ones as it was very interesting and the Scylla and Charybdis story was one of the easier Odyssey stories to read and understand. In the beginning we talked about the Trolley problems, which people had to choose between the lesser of two evils which then connected to our reading with the Odyssey about how he had two choices between two decisions that could cause life or death for his men. In this lesson we see Odysseus showing his leadership characteristics by cheering up his men so that none of them accepted their fate of death already and would try their hardest. Overall I loved this lesson and especially the kahoot since I got to see what other people thought and what their reasons were behind their choices they made.
No comments:
Post a Comment