The Tikkun Project
Lesson
4
Values in Action
Concept
To build a flourishing community, students must recognize that every physical action is driven by an underlying value. By pairing the wisdom of ancient ethical texts with modern character vocabulary, students learn to decode human behaviour, selecting the core values and actions that will define their official Class Community Agreement.
Focus Question
LOI 1: What values can be noticed in a positive class community, and how can they best inform our actions?
Knowledge & Understanding Goals
Language, Comprehension Strand C, Grade 3: Analyze language and vocabulary connected to abstract attributes, using evidence to justify how specific actions reflect those underlying values.
Language, Oral Communication Strand B, Grade 3: Participate in structured discussion, using evidence to support or challenge a peer's reasoning.
Thinking & Learning Skills
Thinking Skills (Categorization): Matching a concrete action to the abstract value it demonstrates.
Learner Profile Connection (Principled): Recognizing that strength, wisdom, and worth are defined by choices, not by external markers.
Context
Building directly on the raw classroom actions gathered in Lesson 3, students now examine the why behind those behaviours, using the Lesson 1 stem at full strength for the first time. By mapping actions to explicit value vocabulary, the class constructs its foundational Class Community Agreement.
Focus question(s) for this lesson: What values drive our actions, and how can we use these values to build a binding agreement for our classroom community?
Lesson Outline
NAMING OUR ASSUMPTIONS
Write three open-ended stems on the board: "I would say that someone is wise if..."; "...strong if..."; "...rich if..." Invite brief responses (typically: good grades, big muscles, lots of money).
MEETING THE CORE TEXT Introduce Pirkei Avot 4:1 (Ben Zoma): Who is wise? One who learns from every person. Who is strong? One who controls their impulses. Who is rich? One who is content with what they have. Who is honoured? One who honours their fellow human beings. Discuss: this text measures wisdom and strength by choices and actions, not external markers - our values are the internal compasses that guide our external actions. LEARNING A VALUES VOCABULARY Introduce a Values & Attributes (Middot) Wall with key vocabulary across languages: Ometz Lev/Courage; Chesed/Kindness; Chochma/Wisdom; Acharayut/Responsibility; Tzedek/Fairness; Savlanut/Patience; Ekroniyot/Principled; Manhigut/Leadership. MAPPING ACTIONS TO VALUES In small groups, students take the sticky-note actions generated in Lesson 3 and sort/paste them under the value header that best explains why someone performs that action, using the Lesson 1 stem to justify each placement out loud: "I know this action shows Acharayut because if I observed someone keeping their desk tidy, I'd say they're being responsible." If an action fits multiple values, students make a case for their choice, again grounding the case in the stem. FINALIZING THE CLASS AGREEMENT Review the mapped Values Wall together: how well do these values represent our classroom community? Are any missing? Consolidate into a visual display (a Class Community Rainbow or Values Anchor Chart). SIGNING THE AGREEMENT Each student chooses one action they can commit to for a positive learning environment, writes it in the margin, and signs their name as a symbol of agreement.
Notes for Teaching and Evaluation
Starting with students' own (often externally-focused) assumptions about wisdom/strength/wealth, before introducing the text, means Ben Zoma's reframing lands as a genuine reversal of expectation rather than a fact simply delivered.
Sorting Lesson 3's own sticky-note actions under value headers keeps the Values Wall grounded in the class's own real, already-observed behaviours, not abstract hypothetical examples.
Explicitly requiring the Lesson 1 stem here - not just sorting actions by feel - is what makes this the unit's real payoff moment for that habit of mind: students have now used it to judge a stranger (Lesson 1), reverse-engineered it from a drawing (Lesson 3), and now apply it rigorously to their own classroom's real behaviours, with a text as the final test.