Friedrich Nietzsche – Perseverance
“What does not kill me makes me stronger.”
Friedrich Nietzsche
Big Idea
Everybody experiences struggle. Sometimes the struggle ends up making the person more self-confident, stronger and better able to move forward to the next challenge. But other times adversity breeds fear and inaction. Every struggle is an opportunity for students to make an ethical choice on how to respond in a way that helps them cope with the challenges they will face.
Claim
German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche claims that if people can survive through struggles, they will emerge as stronger people.
Counterclaim
If you experience difficulty all the time, it weakens you so the smart thing to do is to stop trying and protect yourself against future harm.
Essential
Question
Do you have to go through bad experiences to be a strong person?
Student Video
Great Depression – Perseverance
In teaching about The Great Depression it would be a great idea to look at the theme of perseverance. During horrible economic turmoil, instead of giving up the United States and Franklin D. Roosevelt ...
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The young adult novel Hatchet by Gary Paulsen pairs perfectly with the Friedrich Nietzsche conversation on perseverance. This survival story lends itself to a post-reading discussion on not giving up ...
