Read through a testimony provided by one of the people saved by Oskar Schindler. Understand what it was like for a Jewish person to trust a German during this time.
During the Holocaust we can see numerous accounts of non-Jews, or gentiles going out of their way to rescue Jews from being taken, harmed or deported.
Discuss the following quote by Suzy Kassem: “Stand up for what is right against the wrong.”
Ask the students what they think this means. Do they know what it means to be an upstander?
You may want to provide students with the definition of an upstander: a person who speaks or acts in support of an individual or cause, particularly someone who intervenes on behalf of a person being attacked or bullied.
Next, introduce Oskar Schindler. Tell your students that Oskar Schindler was one of the most famous rescuers during the Holocaust. His status as a factory owner allowed him to hire Jews and protect them from deportations. He had been arrested several times for his apparent favoritism towards Jews but this did not deter him. Schindler and his wife are responsible for the rescue of 1,200 persecuted Jews.
Direct students to the Testimony of Yitzhak Stern from Yad Vashem. Explain that they will be reading the testimony of someone saved by Oskar Schindler. Ask students to read the testimony to themselves. Open up a discussion with the class asking the following questions:
Divide the class into groups of three or five. After reviewing the quote and Yitzhak’s testimony, create a brief presentation on what it means to be an upstander. Presentations can be made with Prezi, PowerPoint, or done verbally depending on what time permits. Students may want to use this additional resource by the US Holocaust Memorial Museum to help them with their presentations.
Here are some questions to help focus the presentation:
This lesson meets the following Academic Standards required by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.
Before you teach, use our teacher primer to freshen up on your content knowledge.
Milton Mayer, an American journalist and educator, interviewed people to find out how they reacted to Hitler’s policies. Students will read a testimony from a German professor on his being a bystander during the Nazi era.
Bystanders during the Holocaust came in all forms. Many felt it uncomfortable to stray from their everyday thinking, despite the obvious unjustness that was taking place around them.
Distribute the Range of Human Behavior Vocabulary Terms worksheet by Facing History and Ourselves. Go over the actual meaning for each of the terms with the class. Tell students to keep these worksheets as they could be useful in later lessons/discussions about perpetrators, victims, and upstanders.
Perpetrator: a person who carries out a harmful, illegal, or immoral act.
Victim: a person harmed, injured, or killed as a result of a crime, accident, or other event or action.
Bystander: a person who is present at an event or incident but does not take part.
Upstander: a person who speaks or acts in support of an individual or cause, particularly someone who intervenes on behalf of a person being attacked or bullied.
Direct students to the resource, No Time to Think by Facing History and Ourselves. There is an audio version of the testimony that you can play if you would like to have your students listen as they follow the written testimony. Alternatively, you can just read it without listening to the audio.
Before breaking students off in groups to complete the Output section, click on the identity chart link from the second question at the bottom of the page and show the students what it is supposed to look like.
In groups of three to five, have students go over the Connection Questions found at the bottom of the page. If time permits, open up into a group discussion going over some (or all) of the questions. Have groups share their identity chart.
This lesson meets the following Academic Standards required by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.
Before you teach, use our teacher primer to freshen up on your content knowledge.
Students will read and examine a copy of the minutes of the Wannsee Conference, which helped to determine the fate of European Jews and remains one of the most damning pieces of evidence about the intentions of the Nazis in committing genocide.
The genocide of European Jews was meticulously planned by Nazi authorities; it required the cooperation of numerous facets of German government and society, such as the military, the railroads, immigration offices, etc.
Give a short background of events leading up to the Wannsee conference. Make sure to mention that mass killing of European Jews had already begun, but it was not as widespread or organized. Give a list of the different people attending the conference, found here, as well as their jobs, to show the variety of different governmental agencies who were brought together to cooperate in genocide.
Divide the class into groups of 4 or 5. Provide each group with a copy of the Wannsee conference minutes. Give the groups 15 minutes to read through the minutes and ask them to highlight words or phrases used in relation to the fate of Jewish populations (i.e. “evacuation to the East”). If students are unsure, a good example would be the phrase “Jewish question” itself as it is not readily apparent that the “Jewish question” means “How do we get rid of European Jews?”
Lead the class in a discussion following the words and phrases that students highlighted. Explain these terms and phrases, and what they really meant (i.e. “evacuation to the East” meaning “being sent to a concentration or death camp”). Make sure to point out phrases that may have been overlooked.
Finish the discussion with an overview of what we can learn from this document, including relevant questions; this document shows that numerous government authorities were in cooperation in an effort to carry out this genocide:
This lesson meets the following Academic Standards required by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.
Before you teach, use our teacher primer to freshen up on your content knowledge.
Go over documents used during the Nuremberg Trials. (Some of the images contain graphic content.) Students will learn how the Nuremberg Trials came to be and the lasting impact these trials had on future cases of international injustice.
The Nuremberg Trials set the precedent that individual officials could be held responsible for “crimes against humanity” and for implementing policies that violate international law — regardless of their status as government officials.
Ask the class how they would define the terms “justice” and “accountability.” Write the words or phrases they come with on the board, then ask them the following questions:
Familiarize students with the resource, Justice and Accountability by the US Holocaust Memorial Museum. Show students that there are three sections of images and texts followed by a quote; Documenting the Crimes, The Trials, and Lasting Legacies.
Divide the class into three groups and assign them one of the three categories: Documenting the Crimes, The Trials, and Lasting Legacies and one of the quotes. These groups can end up being quite large depending on class size. Allow groups to divide up the images to go over in subgroups, as long as they all get together to discuss.
Provide the following instructions while they get into their groups:
This lesson meets the following Academic Standards required by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.
Before you teach, use our teacher primer to freshen up on your content knowledge.
Acquaint students with eugenics, a movement that distorted science in order to justify negative ideas about minorities and people with disabilities.
Eugenics was an idea that captured the interest of governments all over the world in the early 20th century and had horrific consequences for minority groups.
The lesson focuses on Eugenics in America, since the primary source materials are all in English already. However, it is important to set the stage for a tie back to Germany as well.
Begin the lesson by reading these two quotes and asking your students to summarize their meaning and how they are affected by them. In short, what is being said and how do they feel about the statements?
Note at the end that these are quotes from Adolf Hitler.
Divide the class into four and distribute one image to each group:
Fair Exhibit
Eugenics Tree
Promotion for Native Sterilization
Popular Science
Use the See, Think, Wonder strategy for analyzing these images in each group (see below)
Bring all the groups together and ask each to present their image to the larger group. As they share what they see, think and wonder, encourage broader discussion from the whole group. Also, fill in context as you feel comfortable so as to keep stretching the conversation toward greater clarification.
Finally, ask the group to Wonder again about what remains unknown about the Eugenics movement in America or the relationship between this and Hitler’s Germany. These could prompt additional opportunities for exploration with some of the resources below or through the video or reading in this topic.
This lesson meets the following Academic Standards required by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.
Before you teach, use our teacher primer to freshen up on your content knowledge.
Critically watch a film that promotes to a broad audience the sterilization and so-called mercy killing of non-Aryans by the Nazi regime.
To pursue what the Nazis considered a “pure race of Aryans”, the Third Reich used medical techniques to sterilize and kill those they deemed undesirable.
Review the concepts of euthanasia and propaganda and allude to the fact that mercy killings had to be sold to the public in order for there not to be widespread resistance. Before initiating conversation about the video, be sure to clarify relevant terms. Other concepts that are important here include Darwinism and heredity.
Watch the first 13 minutes of the video, The Killing Films of the Third Reich. Prepare to stop at various sections to discuss and contemplate the content.
Now, ask students to generate their own responses to the video. Ask them to write about:
Then, bring the discussion back to a large group and use student answers to have a large discussion/review sections of the video.
This lesson meets the following Academic Standards required by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.
Before you teach, use our teacher primer to freshen up on your content knowledge.
Students will watch videos and testimonies to learn about people’s experiences at Auschwitz and other extermination camps.
Although the primary goal of the killing centers was that- to kill- there was still a selection process where a small ratio of people were sentenced to work. The selection process and being separated from one’s family left victims traumatized.
Explain to students that there was a very distinct process that the Nazis developed to optimize the efficiency of arrivals at the camps. Ask students if any of them are aware of what this was like? Have they heard anything about the selection process before?
Watch this video by Yad Vashem to get an overview of the structure and layout of Auschwitz. Then show students video testimonies from Ellis Lewin and Eva Kor by USC Shoah Foundation iWitness.
Ellis Lewin Questions:
Eva Kor Questions:
Survivors often describe their arrival at the killing centers as a chaotic time filled with fear and uncertainty. How did listening to these two testimonies contribute to your understanding of this?
This lesson meets the following Academic Standards required by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.
Before you teach, use our teacher primer to freshen up on your content knowledge.
Students will go through testimonies and photographs from the different stages people went through upon deportation to Auschwitz-Birkenau.
Auschwitz-Birkenau is often seen as the symbol of the Holocaust. All phases of getting to, and arriving at, Auschwitz-Birkenau had their own harrowing experiences.
Begin by asking your students, What was Auschwitz? What does it symbolize? What happened there? You may want to show the class a map of the Auschwitz camp by the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.
Ask your students if anyone has visited the site? If someone has, ask them if they would share this experience.
Explain to students that today Auschwitz is a museum and a memorial, therefore when one enters the site today, one will not see the place as it was 60 years ago. Some buildings were preserved and others are gone; there is grass, and so on.
Direct students to the resource by Yad Vashem. Take some time to introduce your class to the site. The numbers in the left sidebar will take you to primary sources accompanying the major phases people went through while in Auschwitz. Click through pages 2-6 to show students what to expect on each page.
Divide the class into groups of three to five and assign each group a number 2-6 (number 1 is the Introduction page) and the resource page that corresponds with that number.
Provide groups with the questions corresponding to their group and give them the instructions below:
Read through the testimonies and look at the photographs for your designated section.
Prepare a presentation answering the questions that accompany your topic.
If possible, project the page for each group as they present so the entire class can see the images and testimonies that are being discussed. Present in order, having the group for Arrivals start off.
If time permits, end the class by showing students this drone footage of Auschwitz 70 years after it was liberated.
This lesson meets the following Academic Standards required by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.
Before you teach, use our teacher primer to freshen up on your content knowledge.
Hear the testimony of a man forced out of his home country during the Nazi’s program of mass deportations. This lesson will also introduce students to an ongoing debate about whether or not genocide was always Hitler’s intention, or the result of a failure to expel the Jews from Europe.
Before killing centers and concentration camps Nazi Germany tried expelling the Jews to remove them from Germany.
Write down the word, “Deportation” on the board. Ask students what comes to mind when they think of it.
You might expect students to say things such as: separation, returning to their home country, people being sent away unwillingly.
Re-introduce the term scapegoat, noting that deportations are often the result of scapegoating.
→ scapegoat: a person who is blamed for the wrongdoings, mistakes, or faults of others, especially for reasons of expediency.
Ask students if they have ever thought about why someone might get deported and what this might do to them and their family.
Show the class Part 1 (the first 3:34 minutes) of the Yad Vashem video, The Development of the ‘Final Solution’.
Then, ask the class whether they lean toward the perspective of the Intentionalists or the Functionalists and why.
Then, watch Bert Flemming’s testimony from the US Holocaust Memorial Museum. The testimony is quite long, the part that will be used in this lesson is starting at 5:45 and ending at 9:33. Before playing the testimony, read through the overview featured at the top of the page to introduce Bert Flemming and provide some background information.
It may be beneficial for students to read the testimony as the video goes along. The transcript for this video can be found here and the portion of video you will watch begins on page 2 right after 1:06:01.
After you watch the video, take a few minutes to ask the students what they thought of Bert Flemming’s testimony. Allow the students to ask some questions, to provide comments about what they heard. If you are having some trouble getting the conversation started, try asking the following questions:
Finally, return to the question of the scapegoat.
Ask students why they thought Nazi Germany was trying to push the Jews into Poland. Then, dig a little deeper: what is the end game for the Nazis? Would mass expulsion ever really work to meet the interests of the Nazi party?
Finally, prompt them to consider in writing the following question:
Does scapegoating naturally lead to the worst possible outcomes for the targeted group in a given situation?
This lesson meets the following Academic Standards required by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.
Before you teach, use our teacher primer to freshen up on your content knowledge.
Read excerpts from Elie Wiesel’s Day of Remembrance addresses. Students will have a discussion about commemoration and remembrance.
Holocaust remembrance is important to ensure that the story of those who lost their lives does not go forgotten. The hope is that by teaching the Holocaust and preserving the memory we can keep history from repeating itself.
Start off by reading this story to the class:
When Rebbe Israel Baal Shem Tov, the founder of Hasidism, saw the Jewish people were threatened by tragedy, he would go to a particular place in the forest where he lit a fire, recited a particular prayer, and the miracle was accomplished, averting the tragedy.
Later, when the Baal Shem Tov’s disciple the Maggid of Mezrich had to intervene with heaven for the same reason, he went to the same place in the forest, where he told the Master of the Universe that while he did not know how to light the fire, he could still recite the prayer, and again, the miracle was accomplished.
Later still, Rebbe Leib of Sasov, in turn, a disciple of the Maggid of Mezrich, went into the forest to save his people. “I do not know how to light the fire,” he said to God, “and I do not know the prayer, but I can find the place and that must be sufficient.” Once again, the miracle was accomplished.
When it was the turn of Rebbe Israel of Rizhyn, the great-grandson of the Maggid of Mezrich who was named after the Baal Shem Tov, to avert the threat, he sat in his armchair, holding his head in his hands, and said to God: “I am unable to light the fire, I do not know the prayer, and I cannot even find the place in the forest. All I can do is tell the story. That must be enough.” And it was enough.
Elie Wiesel, Holocaust survivor, author, and professor, used this story to explain how someone who has little to no connection with the past, can still be a custodian of memory. Wiesel said that, “Like the Rebbe of Rizhyn, we may not know how to light the fire, we may not know the prayer, and we may not know the place in the forest. Our connection to the past is weak; it may be distant, at a remove. All we can do is tell the story, and we must. But in order to tell the story, we must first hear the story.”
Witness: Lessons from Elie Wiesel’s Classroom by Ariel Burger (Pg. 31-32)
Direct students to the resource, Elie Wiesel: Days of Remembrance Excerpts, from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.
Divide the class into groups of three. Assign each group an excerpt from one of the years: 2001, 2002, 2003, or 2004. It is fine that groups will have repeat excerpts.
As students get together with their groups, provide them with the instructions below. Give students 15-20 minutes for this.
Reconvene as a class and open the class to a discussion with the questions below:
This lesson meets the following Academic Standards required by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction.
Before you teach, use our teacher primer to freshen up on your content knowledge.
