Title – The Holocaust


(Extermination of the Eastern European Jews, 1933-1045)

By – Esta Sobey

Primary Subject – Social Studies

Grade Level – 10-12

Time Requirement – 7 (45-minute) lessons

Unit Standards and Objectives:

Massachusetts Curriculum Frameworks for History and Social Science (August 2003):
• USII.15
  “Analyze how German aggression in Europe and Japanese aggression in Asia contributed to the start of World War II and summarize the events of the war: Fascism in Germany and Italy; German rearmament and militarization of the Rhineland; German seizure of Austria, Czechoslovakia and the invasion of Poland.”
• WHII.21
  Totalitarianism in Italy, Germany, etc.
• WHII.23C
  German aggression in the 1930s
• WHII.26
  “Describe the background, course and consequences of the Holocaust, including its roots in the long tradition of Christian anti-Semitism in 19th century ideas about race and nation, and Nazi dehumanization of the Jews.”

Behavioral Objectives:

• The students will discover the underlying causes of the “Extermination of the European Jews” (Holocaust) by reading from selected websites and completing a chart delineating the insidious development of the Nazi plans for separation and extermination of the Jews of Germany and eastern Europe (cognitive domain)
  
• The students will experience life in the ghettoes and camps by reading diaries and survivor accounts from the sources listed below and participating in a cooperative learning, “jigsaw,” activity (cognitive and affective domains)
  
• The students will read accounts of resistance and rescue and compose a fictional diary entry assuming the role of resistor or rescuer (cognitive and affective)
  
• The students will synthesize their learning by completing a final essay on an exam (cognitive, critical thinking)

Materials:

Websites and books listed below, and others selected by the students

Vocabulary:

Anti-Semitism

Genocide

Totalitarian

Fascism

Eugenics

Treaty of Versailles

Mein Kampf

Aryan

Rhineland

Reichstag

Gestapo

Nazi Party

Fuhrer

Swastika

Propaganda

Boycott

Nuremberg Laws

Ghetto

Euthanasia

Concentration camps

Buchenwald

Anschluss

Evian Conference

Krisstallnacht

Deportation

Final Solution

S.S. St. Louis

Madagascar Plan

Sutthof concentration camp

Lodz ghetto

Vichy

Warsaw ghetto

Einstazgruppen

Other ghettos: Krakow, Lublin, Minsk, Kishinev, Bialystock, Vilna, Kovno, Riga

Auschwitz

Theresienstadt

Wannsee Conference

Treblinka

Sobibor

Majdanek

Warsaw Ghetto Uprising

Holocaust

Zionism

Nuremberg War Crimes Trial

Displaced Persons

Procedure:

1. Students will read background information from the following websites:

   • http://history1900s.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?zi=1/XJ/Ya&sdn;=history1900s&zu;=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ushmm.org%2Fwlc%2Farticle.php%3Flang%3Den%26ModuleId%3D10005143,

     
     

   • http://history1900s.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?zi=1/XJ/Ya&sdn;=history1900s&zu;=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.ushmm.org%2Fwlc%2Farticle.php%3Flang%3Den%26ModuleId%3D10005143,

     
     

   • http://remember.org/guide/Facts.root.solution.html

2. Students will take notes, and begin a chart on the development of Nazi plans for extermination of the Jews

3. Class discussion will revolve around these key questions:
   • How did the German experience of World War I and its outcome sow the seeds for Hitler’s rise to power?
     
   • Why were Hitler and his ideas appealing to the Germans?
     
   • How were the Jews’ civil rights taken away? [construction of chart/timeline]
     
   • Why the Jews?
     
   • What other groups were targets?

4. The students will complete the following activities, assignments, and exam questions.

Activity 1:

• Students will then select one of the following scenarios to investigate:
  • Life in a ghetto such as Warsaw
    
  • Life in a concentration camp such as Auschwitz
    
  • Life as a rescuer or resister

• The students will read background information relating to the above topics at the following websites:

  • http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/ghettos/warsawghetto.html

    
    

  • http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/lodz.html

    
    

  • http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/survivor/index.html

    
    

  • http://fcit.coedu.usf.edu/holocaust/people/survivor.htm

    
    

  • http://cghs.dade.k12.fl.us/holocaust/French_resistance.htm

    
    

  • http://www.oskarschindler.com/

    
    

  • http://www.holocaustsurvivors.org/survivors.php

    
    

  • http://history1900s.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nizkor.org%2Ffeatures%2Fdentist%2F

    
    

  • http://history1900s.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http%3A%2F%2Flibrary.thinkquest.org%2F12663%2Fsurvivors%2Fwitness.html

    
    

  • http://history1900s.about.com/cs/rescuers/

    
    

  • http://holocaustforgotten.com/rescuers.htm

    
    

  • Weisel, Elie.
    
    Night
    
    
  • Frank, Anne.
    
    Diary of Anne Frank
    
    

  • http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/ghettos/acdiary.html

    
    

  • http://www.deathcamps.org/occupation/ringelblum.html

    
    

  • http://www.jewishgen.org/ForgottenCamps/Witnesses/TheresEng.html

    
    

  • http://auschwitz.dk/Denmark.htm

Activity 2:

• Students will participate in two cooperative groups:
  • First, with others studying the same topic, to synthesize their learning and finalize a presentation, complete with visual aids (PowerPoints, pictures, etc.).
  • Then, they will be ‘jigsawed’ (i.e. form new groups consisting of students who had studied different topics) to teach the material to the others who had not studied that scenario, as in a ’round robin’ format.

• At the end, the original groups will make the presentations to the whole class and to invited classes and guests. All students will be responsible for all the material.

Written assignment:

After the presentations, the students will compose a fictional account of a rescue or resistance, taking on the persona of one of the above. They will share their ‘stories’ with the rest of the class the following day.

Evaluation:

The final exam will be an in-class essay answering the following:
1. Given all that we have learned in this unit about the involuntary movement of people by governments and followers, could this happen today? Why or why not?
   
2. Are there reasons to be hopeful? Explain.

E-Mail

Esta Sobey

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