Good Friday

Got this from the net ... Ken Collins website ...

Why do we call it ‘Good’ Friday?
Calling the day of the Crucifixion ‘Good’ Friday is a designation that is peculiar to the English language. In German, for example, it is called Karfreitag. The Kar part is an obsolete word, the ancestor of the English word care in the sense of cares and woes, and it meant mourning. So in German, it is Mourning Friday. And that is what the disciples did on that day—they mourned. They thought all was lost.
I’ve read that the word good used to have a secondary meaning of holy, but I can’t trace that back in my etymological dictionary. There are a number of cases in set phrases where the words God and good got switched around because of their similarity. One case was the phrase God be with you, which today is just good-bye. So perhaps Good Friday was originally God’s Friday. But I think we call it Good Friday because, in pious retrospect, all that tragedy brought about the greatest good there could be.
I can see virtue in either terminology. If we call it Mourning Friday, as in German, we are facing reality head on, taking up the cross if you will, fully conscious that the Christian walk is seldom a walk in the park. But if we call it Good Friday, as in English, we are confessing the Christian hope that no tragedy—not even death—can overwhelm God’s providence, love, and grace. Either way seems fine to me!
You can read more about this topic if you are wondering if the Crucifixion took place on a Friday.
Starting Page > Questions > Top of this Page Copyright ©1995-2005 by the Rev. Kenneth W. Collins and his licensors. All rights reserved.You can get permission to use this material. You can also write to Ken.

Yen and Yang

I've started volunteering at the Henderson Student Care. Reckon I better teach somebody something before I go nuts. This is the disposition of a TEACHER. You got to TEACH.

They've given me two APSN girls - Yen and Yang (assumed names, of course). What's APSN?
APSN = Association of Persons with Special Needs.
Go check them out at www.apsn.org.sg
They used to be called AESN, which stands for Association for the Educationally Subnormal. Yeah, right. You can understand why they changed the name, can't you?

Anyways, the girls have an identified IQ of about 70, and it's been an interesting experience teaching them.

Today is my 4th lesson with them.
They are making great progress!
They can do number bonds quite well up to 5 now.

It's interesting that at each session, one of them will excel above the other. And they take turns so far. Today was YANG. Last lesson was YEN. Wonder if it will be YEN again next lesson. It's been like that so far.

Taught them to count in 10's today.
They went like .... 10, 20, 30 ... 90, 20.
Take 4 ten rods, and 5 ones.
They'll be counting them as 10, 20, 30, 40 .... (and the ones) 50, 60, 70, 80, 90!
Quite a challenge.

Had to show them. Showed them how to represent 45 in tens and ones with UNIFIX cubes.
They saw nothing wrong with identical sets of rods represented as 45 by me ... and counted as 90 by them. They said it was ok. They put the shorter column on different sides and said it was significantly different.
Hence, one was 45. The other was 90.

HO HUM!