Summer professional development seminar

I have just returned from New York City and the Holocaust Memorial Library’s Summer Seminar for teachers.  The library was established by Auschwitz survivor Olga Lengyel whose dream it was to never forget the victims of the Holocaust.  The Holocaust Educators Network or HEN works out of Olga’s home to give teachers from all over the nation an opportunity to learn and collaborate about teaching the Holocaust.  

This summer teachers shared experiences like attending a Shabbat service and dinner, visits to the Museum of Jewish Heritage and the Jewish Museum, a whole day session with Holocaust survivor Irving Roth, sessions with Stuart Liebman, Professor Emeritus of Queens College and the Graduate Center of CUNY and a renown historian of media studies, several second generation speakers, and face to face dialogue with authors, artists and musicians.  Participants spent time presenting and listening to each other’s Holocaust lessons as well as the writings and reflections that came out of our 9:00am – 9:00pm days.  

I have attended many conferences and seminars on the Holocaust and the Civil War in the past decade.  Never have I been treated with such dignity, respect and admiration as the Memorial Library treated me with during these intense two weeks of study.  I had lots of questions as I started this seminar and many got answered.  I left with new questions that only work and study and reading for a lifetime will answer.  All I know is that I have a renewed passion to teach this important and difficult topic.  Making the Holocaust relevant to my students so that together we can strive for social justice in our troubled world has always been and will remain my goal.  Olga would truly be proud of the library and teachers’ efforts.

Note: Olga Lengyel's memoir, Five Chimneys, is available for free loan from the MCHE Resource Center.

Another successful year

In reflecting on the past year, I feel that using the Echoes and Reflections curriculum with my 8^th grade literature students was very successful.  This program is divided into ten lessons.  Each lesson provides a historical context for the topic as well as survivor testimony and primary source material, including photographs, diary entries, poems and historical documents.   It is an excellent resource for material to use in your class.  You certainly do not have to teach all of the units by incorporating the survivor testimony would be a great way to bring the individual aspect of Holocaust study to you students.

My students finished the lessons on studying the Holocaust and antisemitism.  They also studied the history of Nazi Germany leading to the unit on the Final Solution.  This program offers them an opportunity to analyze photographs and propaganda material.  I conclude each unit with a test over the material and an ending project.  

In addition to Echoes and Reflections, my students also read a variety of Holocaust literature.  Within their literature circle groups, they read The Diary of Anne Frank, A Coming Evil, the Boy Who Dared, Behind the Bedroom Wall, Torn Thread, Play to the Angels, Someone Named Eva, Yellow Star, I Have Lived a Thousand Years and All But My Life.

As a class they read Surviving Hitler by Andrea Warren.  This memoir chronicles the experiences of local Holocaust survivor, JackMandelbaum during his adolescent years in World War II Europe.  There is an excellent teaching guide for this memoir on the MCHE web site.

I used Jennifer Jenkin’s lesson on a wall of remembrance quilt with my students as a culminating activity.  This offered them an opportunity to reflect on the material they studied and choose something that personally affected them.  The other students in the school and many parents asked questions about the quilt squares and this lead to discussions about the importance of the study of the Holocaust.

NOTE: The Midwest Center for Holocaust Education will be offering a training, conducted by an educator from Yad Vashem, over the Echoes and Reflections curriculum on July 25, 2012. All participants receive a complimentary copy of the curriculum! Enroll now!

Meeting Common Core Standards with Echoes and Reflections

With much gnashing of teeth and pulling of hair, education is once again trying a new initiative – Common Core State Standards (CCSS).  CCSS hopes to make clear what our students are expected to learn as well as “The standards are designed to be robust and relevant to the real world, reflecting the knowledge and skills that our young people need for success in college and careers. With American students fully prepared for the future, our communities will be best positioned to compete successfully in the global economy.” (http://www.corestandards.org/) 

It’s not the mission of CCSS that is making teachers moan, rather it’s the idea that we’ve all been down this road before and this is just the next, newest, brilliant idea.  As a library media specialist and Holocaust educator, I see the CCSS differently.  CCSS reading standards talk about creating a “staircase” of complexity in what students are able to read K-12 so they are ready for college and career reading.  CCSS presents an amazing opportunity to use primary sources from the Holocaust to provide students with the complex text to become better readers whether it’s diary entries, letters, poetry, or documents.  

In the Echoes and Reflections: A Multimedia Curriculum on the Holocaust and its companion IWitness, you can find a multitude of primary resources and ideas.  Search for topics from over 9,000 search terms.  Even better, there are 1,000 survivor testimonies and thought-provoking lessons to go along with all of these resources.  CCSS for reading gives teachers permission to use complex text to make students better readers.  “Echoes and Reflections” and “IWitness” provide that complex text as well as multiple perspectives through ample primary sources.  Both make the Holocaust more relevant to our students and ultimately to their success.  

 ______________________________________________________________________________

The Midwest Center for Holocaust Education has been designated as an Echoes and Reflections training center. Echoes and Reflections is a testimony-based curriculum for educators of grades 7-12. Arranged into ten chapters covering the scope and sequence of the Holocaust, the curriculum is scalable and relies heavily on exploration and analysis of primary sources. A local training will be held on July 25, 2012 with an educator from Yad Vashem.

1942 and the Final Solution - A Course for Educators

This course explores the path and process of the Final Solution, offers in-depth analysis of the death camp system with a special emphasis on the Operation Reinhard Camps, and considers the impact of a short 11-month time frame from mid-1942 through mid-1943 that saw the destruction of millions of people. Analysis of primary source documents, exposure to ready-made lesson plans, and practice with these resources will equip teachers with tools to engage their students in meaningful learning about the Final Solution. 

 

Appropriate for 7-12th grade classrooms. 

 

Complete details and registration available HERE!

Complicate Your Thinking

When I signed up for MCHE’s four-day summer education seminar, “Responses to the Holocaust: Perpetrators, Victims, and Bystanders,” I assumed it would be a chance for me to review and solidify my understanding of the Holocaust.

Well, the seminar ended up being a good reminder that it’s not wise to make assumptions, because I spent most of it “complicating my thinking.” Mitch Braff, executive director of the Jewish Partisan Educational Foundation, used this phrase to encourage us to embrace the Holocaust’s complexities. The presenters made me question basic assumptions I had about the Holocaust. Here are some examples:

· By analyzing actual train shipments, noted historian Dr. Robert Jan van Pelt challenged the commonly held belief that the Germans diverted resources from the Eastern Front to murder Jews. According to his research, in 1944 at the height of the Hungarian deportation, only ten of every 25,000 trains running each day in Europe were designated for the deportation of Jews.

· Dr. Severin Hochberg, a former historian with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, discussed the extent to which the Catholic Church, and specifically Pope Pius XII, was a bystander.

· On the final day, we explored the role of Jewish partisans in the war and the ethical issues they faced.

This seminar did complicate my thinking, but in a good way. Participating in these discussions reminded me that history is about real people, and it must be understood with all of its complexities to do it justice.

Alfred Lerner Fellow Summer Institute for Teachers

This is a guest blog by Terry Beasley, an educator at Lakeview Middle School in the Park Hill School District. This summer Terry was MCHE's representative to the Alfred Lerner Summer Institute for Teachers held by the Jewish Foundation for the Righteous.

__________________________________________________________________________________

I headed to New York on June 25, 2011 to participate in the Alfred Lerner Fellow Summer Institute for Teachers.  I was one of 35 educators selected for this prestigious program held on the campus of Columbia University.  I was looking forward to gaining new knowledge and instructional strategies that I could use in my classroom during our studies of the Holocaust.  I had completed my assigned readings, completed my pre-institute assignments, and had my suitcase packed.  

My experience with the Alfred Lerner Fellowship Institute was more than I could have imagined.  The caliber of instructors and presenters during the week was exceptional.   I was very fortunate to have this opportunity. 

Professor John Roth gave a historical history of the evolution of anti-Semitism based on the religious differences throughout history.  Professor Volker Berghahn discussed the interwar period in Germany and the impact of World War I on all the nations, which helped clarify the mindset of the various nations.  Professor Harry Reicher, University of Pennsylvania Law School, gave an amazing and very insightful presentation on how Hitler and the Nazi regime used the law to manipulate Germany and its citizens.  I found this session extremely interesting because it clarified how the Nazi Party was able to use the legal system as a tool or vehicle to obtain the goals of the Nazi organization.  Professor Peter Hayes discussed the use of big business by the Nazi government and really explained how businesses became involved and then immersed in the crimes of the Nazis.  Henry Feingold addressed the issue of refugees and the responses of individuals and countries to this world crisis.  Professor Jeffrey Burds did an excellent presentation on the use of propaganda by the Nazi regime.  Much of the information that Professor Burds shared was new documentation that he has been researching in recent years.  This new evidence shows how the Nazis targeted propaganda for different regions of Europe to personalize anti-Semitism in specific areas.  

Sheila Hanson from the Shoah Foundation instructed us on how to access IWitness to access the visual history testimonies of over 52,000 individuals from 56 countries.  These resources can be used in a variety of ways by teachers or by students.  Roman Kent shared his personal story of his life and survival before, during and after the Holocaust.  He stressed that any study of the Holocaust should include who the people were before and who they were afterwards.    Mr. Kent was so personable and his story was quite emotional.  The author and instructor Nechama Tec shared her personal testimony and then led a question and answer session regarding her books she started writing in 1970 when her memories started becoming an issue for her.  

Our final day was spent with Robert Jan van Pelt, who traveled to Germany in the fall of 1989 following the fall of the Berlin Wall to search the archives of Nazi Germany.  Professor van Pelt told many fascinating accounts of his experiences with Holocaust research and documentation. 

Another aspect of this experience was the connections and friendships that evolved.  I met many passionate and dedicated educators from all parts of the United States who are dedicated to teaching the truth about this historical event.  I had the pleasure of sharing my room with Katarzyna from Minsk, Poland.  We had four educators from Poland, one journalist who works at Auschwitz, one employee from the United Nations, and two educators from Croatia in our fellowship.  The opportunity to discuss and collaborate with educators from these areas was so insightful and meaningful as we shared teaching strategies, as well as historical perspectives.  It was a wonderful group of individuals with whom I will continue to communicate with in the future.  

On a personal note, my selection as the recipient of the Eduard Sonder Award was extremely impacting for me.  Based on my application, the granddaughters of Mr. Sonder select the recipient of this annual award.  I met both of the granddaughters, as well as a great-granddaughter and a great-great granddaughter while I was attending the ALF Institute in New York.  I had an opportunity to visit with all of them following a presentation.  I was given a copy of the family story, a copy of a family photograph of Eduard Sonder, and a box of chocolates from the same Swiss Chocolatier that Mr. Sonder would bring to his granddaughters from his business travels when the family lived in Germany.  Both of the granddaughters are such delightful ladies and I was so humbled that they selected me.  

I am thankful for the opportunity to have been an Alfred Lerner Fellow and to those who encouraged me to apply, as well as to those who helped support my journey.  I believe that I am better equipped as a teacher to help my students understand the depth and the impact of the Holocaust.

Unique Summer Course

Responses to the Holocaust: Perpetrators, Victims, Bystanders

July 18-21, 2011
8:30-4:00

Jewish Community Campus
5801 W. 115th Street
Overland Park, Kansas

REGISTER BY JULY 1, 2011 TO RECEIVE
YOUR COURSE BOOK BY MAIL!

 This one time only graduate-level course examines the roles of Jewish victims, perpetrators, bystanders, the Allies and neutrals in the Holocaust. The course will feature lectures by guest historians, content-based readings, primary source analysis, survivor testimony, group discussion, and practical application for 7th-12th grade classrooms.

SCHEDULE OF SPEAKERS
July 18-19 will feature presentations by internationally-renowned Auschwitz expert Dr. Robert Jan Van Pelt. Through lecture and discussion, based on his book Holocaust: A History, he will focus on the responses of Jewish victims and perpetrators.

July 20 will feature presentations by Dr. Severin Hochberg, formerly of the Senior Historian’s Office at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and currently teaching in the history department at George Washington University. His sessions will include an in-depth analysis of the international response to the Holocaust - including a focus on refugee issues and bystanders - and the responses of the churches to the Holocaust.

July 21 will feature Mitch Braff, executive director of the Jewish Partisan Educational Foundation (JPEF). Through the use of web-based testimonies, he will bring participants’ focus back to Jewish responses to the Holocaust, specifically armed and unarmed resistance. 

REGISTRATION INFORMATION
The course includes pre-reading for the sessions. Readings will be mailed to those who register by Friday, July 1, 2011.

A registration fee of $75, payable to MCHE, covers lunch on site Monday and Tuesday, course materials, including Robert Jan Van Pelt’s book, Holocaust: A History as well as curriculum materials and a DVD of partisan testimony from JPEF. Snacks and beverages will be provided each day, with lunch on your own Wednesday and Thursday.

Two hours of optional graduate credit will be available from Baker University. A separate enrollment fee of $100, payable to Baker University, will be collected on the first day of class.

CLICK HERE FOR REGISTRATION FORM AND COMPLETE INFORMATION!

Relating the Holocaust to Other Genocides: A Seminar Series for Educators

CLICK HERE FOR REGISTRATION FORM

Conference Room C
Jewish Community Campus
5801 W. 115th Street
Overland Park, Kansas
 
These sessions examine Holocaust history as it relates to other modern genocides. Participants will explore the history of the Holocaust and its connections to genocides in Armenia, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Darfur. Analysis of primary source documents, discussions of the stages of genocide and hands on practice with these resources will equip teachers with tools to engage their students in discussions of the relevance of Holocaust history as well as discussions of genocide prevention and awareness. Sessions will feature hands-on work with lesson plans appropriate for 7-12 th grade classrooms with an emphasis on cross-curricular approaches. All sessions will be led by members of the Isak Federman Holocaust Teaching Cadre with oversight by MCHE's Jessica Rockhold.

Schedule of Sessions:
All sessions meet from 4:30-7:30. Educators may sign up for individual sessions or the entire series.

January 12, 2011 - Defining Genocide / Case Study: The Armenian Genocide

These lessons will analyze the definition of genocide and the eight stages of genocide as well as explore resources for teaching the Armenian genocide and its relationship to the Holocaust

 February 9, 2011– Genocide and the Power of the Written Word: Diaries, Memoirs and Propaganda

These lessons will feature resources and methods that draw connections among genocide experiences, using primary sources including diaries and survivor memoirs and a detailed unit exploring propaganda in the Holocaust and Rwanda.

 March 2, 2011—Choosing to Act: Resisters, Bystanders, Perpetrators

These lessons will explore the responses of various groups to the Holocaust and other genocides, specifically decisions made by bystanders as well as a document-based question on resistance.

 April 13, 2011—Memory and Memorialization: Visual Representations of Genocide Experiences

These lessons will explore art from the Holocaust and other genocides as well as memorialization of these events.

A registration fee of $15 per session covers a light meal and materials. Registration must be received at least 1 week prior to the session for individual sessions or by January 1, 2011 for the entire series. Optional graduate credit (1 hour) through Baker University will be available for an additional $50 fee (payable to Baker).