Balak- Quantity vs. Quality

"The officers of Moav arose and came to Balak and said, 'Balaam has refused to go with us.'

Balak kept on sending officers- more, and higher ranking than these. They came to Balaam and said to him, 'So said Balak son of Zippor, "Do not refrain from going to me, for I will honor you very much, and everything that you say to me I shall do; so go now and imprecate this people for me."'

Balaam answered and said to the servants of Balak, 'If Balak were to give me his houseful of silver and gold, I am unable to transgress the word of Hashem, my G-d, to do anything small or great. And now, you, too, please stay here for the night, and I will know what Hashem will add in speaking with me.'" ~Bamidbar 22:14-19

Quantitative vs. Qualitative:
Quantitative data is information that can be counted or measured.
Qualitative data is information that describes something. 

Parsha Connection:
In this week's parsha, Balak is trying to convince Balaam to invoke a curse upon the Children of Israel. When the first set of elders were sent from Moav, they were unsuccessful in convincing Balaam to curse the Israelites. Without giving up, we learn that Balak sent more, higher ranking officers. We aren't told how many officers were sent each time, nor are we told their specific rankings. Rather, we are given a qualitative description of the officers. We know that the second group was larger and of higher standing than the first group.

In an effort to convince Balaam, Balak sends a message that he will honor Balaam "very much". Again, Balak's offer was a qualitative one- he will honor Balaam "very much"; there is no indication of how he will honor Balaam, or what he will offer him, we just know that it will be a lot of honor.

Balaam's response, however, is a quantitative one. He responds that even if Balak gave over his entire houseful of silver and gold, Balaam is not willing to go against Hashem. Although we don't know how much silver and gold was contained in Balak's house, it is a quantifiable, calculable amount. 

Academic Connection:
Sometimes the difference between quantity and quality is important, and other times it's not critical. For example, if I have 2 sizes of containers to put away toys, the specific sizes probably don't matter- I can look and see that one size is too small, but the other size will work well. If I have half a gallon of water left and want to transfer it to a smaller container, it would be important to know the exact sizes of the two containers so that I will know if the water will fit in one or the other of the containers.

Suggested Activity:

• Younger students could have scenarios set up for them- either as part of a whole class discussion or individual stations for students to go through in partners or individually. Students could have 2 sample situations presented to them where they need to determine "Quantity or Quality?" Sample situations might include:
• Case 1: Your friend's bag of cookies is bigger than your bag of cookies. Case 2: We need 7 more cookies in order to have enough for everyone in the class.
• Case 1: The cookies have black and white frosting on top. Case 2: There are 5 black and white cookies in each package.
• Case 1: Our class collected $50 in tzedaka money. Case 2: Our class collected more money for tzedaka than we did last year.
• Case 1: My house has 3 bedrooms. Case 2: My house is blue.
• Case 1: Your friend has fewer siblings than you. Case 2: Together, you and your friend have 5 siblings.
• After working through some examples, older students could create their own examples and test each other. Another activity might be for students to create 2 short writing samples, one with only qualitative descriptions and the other with only quantitative descriptions. As a class, sharing writing samples, students can think about the differences they notice between the two types of writing samples.
• Note that qualitative information can sometimes be turned into quantitative information, and this might be confusing to students. For example, if I have more cookies than you, that's qualitative. However, we could each count our cookies and then describe the difference using actual numbers, which would be quantitative. Other qualitative information cannot be explained quantitatively- for example, my house being blue.