Materials for Teaching Holocaust and Human Behavior

Teaching Strategy

Develop a classroom contract to create a community of mutual respect and inclusion.

Two students discussing and looking at a paper

Teaching Strategy

Educators will create a practice of student journaling to help their students critically examine their surroundings and make informed judgments.

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Three students sitting in a classroom with one of the students talking.

Book

This resource provides writing prompts and strategies that align Holocaust and Human Behavior with the expectations of the Common Core State Standards.

Common Core: Holocaust and Human Behavior Cover

Reading

Read aloud this letter with your class before you embark on the unit Teaching Holocaust and Human Behavior.

Photography for Facing History and Ourselves web site and publications.

Reading

Inform parents about what their students will be experiencing in the weeks to come during their study of Holocaust and Human Behavior.

Handout

Ask students to reflect on their experiences as students in a classroom community as preparation for creating a classroom contract.

Students work on a classroom activity with highlighters at their desks.

Handout

Help students get started creating their own classroom contract by responding to these sample expectations.

Teaching Strategy

Encourage class participation and develop students’ active listening skills by reading aloud text excerpts.

Students working in groups in a classroom

Teaching Strategy

Educators will create a practice of student journaling to help their students critically examine their surroundings and make informed judgments.

Reading

Reflect on the power of the words that we attach to people through an Anishinaabe woman’s memory of being called an “Indian” while growing up in Canada (Spanish available).

Hands raised in the air by group of people

Reading

A young woman describes her journey overcoming an inner bully and fear of being different (Spanish available).

Reading

Julius Lester describes finding his identity in an unexpected place as an African American teenager living in the segregated South (Spanish available).

Artist Glenn Ligon created Untitled: Four Etchings [B] using a quotation from writer Zora Neale Hurston’s essay, “How It Feels to Be Colored Me.”

Reading

Read the personal reflections of a mother whose young son has challenged her assumptions and expectations about gender identity.

Reading

Explore the complexity of Jewish identity with reflections from three teenagers about what being Jewish means to them.

A woman and a child light a candle as their family gathers during the Passover Seder.

Chapter

How does our society shape the way we define ourselves and others? Explore some of the dilemmas people experience when others perceive them differently than they define themselves.

Blurred crowd used to illustrate "individual and society" in Holocaust and Human Behavior.

Teaching Strategy

Use this graphic tool to help students consider the many factors that shape their own identity and that of groups, nations, and historical and literary figures.

A drawing of a girl with her name Serena Bialkin at the top and characteristics written around her

Teaching Strategy

Students will become “experts” on a topic and then share their new knowledge with peers.

Four students sitting at a table smiling and talking to each other

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Teaching Strategy

Encourage class participation and develop students’ active listening skills by reading aloud text excerpts.

Video

In her TED Talk, writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie describes the effects that labels can have on how we think about ourselves and others.

Reading

Nigerian writer Chimamanda Adichie challenges us to consider the power of stories to influence identity, shape stereotypes, and build paths to empathy (Spanish available).

Reading

Puerto Rican writer Jesús Colón describes a time when his awareness of stereotypes influenced his decision-making.

Handout

Help students process Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s TED Talk with these prompts.

Image

This cartoon by Garry Trudeau explores the ways that identity impacts how we perceive people.

Cartoon depicting two strangers greeting each other, while in thought bubbles each internally assesses the other’s “risk.”

Handout

Use this handout to help your students take notes and stay focused during the Text-to-Text teaching strategy steps.

Teaching Strategy

Students sort, arrange, and connect their thoughts on an idea or question, creating a visual representation of their understanding.

Teaching Strategy

Facilitate thoughtful group discussions by having students first share their ideas in writing and with a partner.

Teaching Strategy

This kinesthetic discussion activity invites students to be active listeners and speakers and to interact with a wide range of classmates.

Teaching Strategy

Encourage all students to share their quick reactions to a question, topic, or text.

Students and teacher engage in discussion in a classroom.

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Reading

Reflect on how individuals, communities, and nations decide who has rights that are worthy of respect and protection with this introduction to the concept of the "universe of obligation."

Integrated classroom listening to lecture.

Chapter

Discover how societies throughout history have defined membership based on ideas about human similarities and differences, such as race, religion, and nation.

Reading

A poem by James Berry invites us to question the ways we as individuals and societies react to difference.

The translation of this sign in this children's book illustration is, “Jews are not welcome here.”

Reading

Journalist Ryszard Kapuscinski traces back to the earliest family-tribes and discusses how human beings either cooperate or divide with “the other."

Handout

Help your students map out their own universe of obligation with this printable handout.

Teaching Strategy

Facilitate thoughtful group discussions by having students first share their ideas in writing and with a partner.

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Book

This resource provides writing prompts and strategies that align Holocaust and Human Behavior with the expectations of the Common Core State Standards.

Teaching Strategy

Get students thinking about the ideas and themes that they’ll encounter in a unit or a text.

Teaching Strategy

Get all students involved by asking them to show their stance on a statement through their positioning around the room.

A students talks with other students in a classroom

Teaching Strategy

Facilitate thoughtful group discussions by having students first share their ideas in writing and with a partner.

Teaching Strategy

Assess students’ understanding, monitor their questions, or gather feedback on your teaching by having them turn in exit cards.

Teaching Strategy

Teach students how to decode an essay prompt with this four-step procedure.

Reading

In a letter to her daughter, Lisa Delpit reflects on how racism has shaped her worldview and her hopes and fears for her child.

Cropped cover of Teaching Holocaust and Human Behavior Unit Outline for Teachers.

Lesson

Students establish a safe space for holding sensitive conversations, before introducing the events surrounding Ferguson, by acknowledging people's complicated feelings about race and creating a classroom contract.

Reading

A poem by James Berry invites us to question the ways we as individuals and societies react to difference.

Handout

This handout introduces students to the idea that when we sort and categorize, we make judgments about which characteristics are more meaningful than others.

Video

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The first episode in the three-part series Race: The Power of an Illusion explores if differences exist in biological variation on the basis of race.

Handout

Have students annotate and reflect on scholar George Fredrickson's definition of race.

Black ink etching on white paper with the words "I do not always feel colored" written repeatedly. The ink gets smudged and illegible toward the end

Video

Third-grade teacher, Jane Elliott meets with her former class to discuss the experiment on discrimination she conducted 15 years earlier and the effects it had on their lives. She also gives the lesson to employees of the Iowa prison system.

Chapter

Discover how societies throughout history have defined membership based on ideas about human similarities and differences, such as race, religion, and nation.

Teaching Strategy

Gauge students’ understanding and interest in a topic by asking them to write down takeaways, questions, and something they enjoyed about a text, film, or lesson.

Student writes in a notebook in classroom

Teaching Strategy

Assess students’ understanding, monitor their questions, or gather feedback on your teaching by having them turn in exit cards.

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Reading

A young Jewish woman shares a time when she encountered someone with a false stereotype about Jews (Spanish available).

Reading

A young Jewish person reflects on the impact of antisemitic myths on attitudes today (Spanish available).

Reading

Olympic gymnast Kerri Strug reflects on why she gets asked the question “You’re Jewish?” (Spanish available).

Reading

Deepen your understanding of the history of antisemitism with this overview of the persecution, violence, and restrictions Jews throughout Europe faced during the Middle Ages.

A contemporary drawing of the Hep! Hep! riots in Frankfurt am Main in 1819. Notice that both men and women participated in the violence.

Reading

Learn about the restricted rights and membership of Jews in newly unified Germany, and antisemitism's pervasiveness across Europe during this period.

Handout

This handout provides students with an overview of the long history of hatred and discrimination against Jews.

Woodcut of a group of men in a pit being set on fire.

Video

Scholars trace anti-Jewish myths, hatred, and violence back to the time of the Roman Empire in this historical overview of anti-Judaism’s roots.

Video

Scholars describe the persistence of antisemitism in Europe from the Enlightenment through World War I and explain how new social, political, and pseudo-scientific justifications were created to perpetuate old prejudices.

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Reading

Gain insight into the death and destruction of World War I with firsthand accounts from former soldiers.

Painting title Gassed by John Singer Sargent. Shows World War I soldiers with bandaged eyes being led by other soldiers. Many dead and injured soldiers laying at the base of the painting.

Reading

Learn about the concessions that the Treaty of Versailles required from Germany after its defeat in World War I (Spanish available).

German delegates talk in May 1919 during the signing of the Treaty of Versailles in France.

Reading

Why did World War I start? Learn about some of the important causes of World War I and the spark that ignited the fighting.

Reading

Get insight into the experiences of soldiers in World War I through poetry and literature excerpts.

A Still image from the 1915 propaganda film The Battle of Somme. A World War I soldier carries a body on his back.

Reading

Find out about the terms of the armistice that ended World War I and the rumors that swirled in its wake.

German military aircraft being dismantled and scrapped after World War I, according to the terms of the Treaty of Versailles.

Map

World War I was fought between the Central powers and the Allied powers simultaneously on several fronts in western Europe, eastern Europe, and the Middle East. See full-sized image for analysis.

Map showing major alliances and advances of the Central and Allied powers during World War I.

Image

John Singer Sargent painted Gassed in 1919, depicting the effects of chemical weapons used by Germans against the British in the Battle of Arras on August 21, 1918.

Image

Dix was a New Objectivist artist known for the brutal realism of his paintings. He was wounded several times by German soldiers on the western front during World War I. He based his series Der Krieg (The War) on these experiences.

Dix was a New Objectivist artist known for the brutal realism of his paintings. He was wounded several times by Germans soldier on the Western Front during World War I. He based his series entitled Der Krieg (The War) on these experiences.

Teaching Strategy

Facilitate thoughtful group discussions by having students first share their ideas in writing and with a partner.

Teaching Strategy

Educators will help students assess what they already know about a topic and what they want to learn.

A close up of a student writing on a piece of paper.

Teaching Strategy

Gauge students’ understanding and interest in a topic by asking them to write down takeaways, questions, and something they enjoyed about a text, film, or lesson.

Teaching Strategy

Encourage all students to share their quick reactions to a question, topic, or text.

Chapter

Investigate how World War I heightened divisions between “we” and “they” among people and nations and left behind fertile ground for Nazi Germany in the following decades.

Teaching Strategy

Students will become “experts” on a topic and then share their new knowledge with peers.

Lesson

Students brainstorm different definitions of democracy and consider democracy's relationship to their own communities and cultures.

Handout

Help students be active listeners of your mini-lecture on the Weimar Republic.

Photo of magician from television presentation in the Weimar Republic.

Handout

Use these photos and fine art from the Weimar Era to have students complete an image-analysis activity.

Handout

Use this handout in a Stations activity that asks students to explore several aspects of life in the Weimar Republic.

A crowd of women standing in line at a polling station in the Weimar Republic in 1919, the first year women were allowed to vote.

Handout

Use this handout in a Stations activity that asks students to explore several aspects of life in the Weimar Republic.

Poster for Women's Day, March 8, 1914, demanding voting rights for women.

Handout

Use this handout in a Stations activity that asks students to explore several aspects of life in the Weimar Republic.

A woman takes a basket of banknotes to buy cabbage at a market during the 1933 hyperinflation in Weimar Germany.

Handout

Use this handout in a Stations activity that asks students to explore several aspects of life in the Weimar Republic.

Handout

Have students demonstrate their understanding of the conflicts and tensions in the Weimar Republic by completing this graphic organizer.

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Teaching Strategy

Students interview classmates to gather evidence and ideas about a topic as they practice being active listeners.

Students in two lines facing and talking to each other.

Teaching Strategy

Teach students to carefully read material by having them underline key words, write margin notes, and summarize main ideas.

Chapter

Explore the efforts to build a democracy in Germany in the 1920s, and examine the misunderstandings, myths, and fears that often undercut those efforts.

In addition to his depictions of World War I, Otto Dix was also known for his ruthless criticism of German society during the Weimar years.

Book

This resource provides writing prompts and strategies that align Holocaust and Human Behavior with the expectations of the Common Core State Standards.

Teaching Strategy

Students seek out and share ideas and information with classmates through this cooperative learning strategy.

Teaching Strategy

Assess students’ understanding, monitor their questions, or gather feedback on your teaching by having them turn in exit cards.

Teaching Strategy

Use a graphic tool to help students centralize and organize evidence as they prepare to respond to a writing prompt.

Reading

Explore the provisions Hitler proposed at the National Socialist German Workers' Party’s first large party gathering 1920.

Reading

Consider the motivations and expectations of Paul von Hindenburg when he appointed Hitler to chancellor of Germany (Spanish available).

Freikorps soldiers during their attempt to overthrow the Weimar government and restore the monarchy in an attempted coup known as the Kapp Putsch in March 1920.

Lesson

Students read fictional biographies of German citizens and make hypotheses about the citizens' voting choices in the Weimar elections.

Video

Scholars Wendy Lower, Peter Hayes, Michael Berenbaum, Jonathan Petropoulos, and Deborah Dwork describe how Adolf Hitler became a powerful political figure in Weimar Germany in the aftermath of World War I.

Handout

Give students these prompts as they watch a short documentary on the Nazis' rise to power.

German military recruits swear allegiance to Adolf Hitler.

Handout

Check-in on students' comprehension of the Nazi Party Platform with these true/false questions.

The Parade of the Political Administrators in Nuremberg, Germany.

Handout

Share this data on the elections in Weimar Germany to prompt discussion about politics in Weimar and the rise of the Nazi party.

Adolf Hitler has his hand placed on a young girl in a white dress as he speaks with her

Image

The 1932 German election ballot featured 36 parties, many of which existed only on paper. The number of different groups made it difficult for any single party to gain a majority in parliament in the Weimar Republic.

A sample 1932 German Election ballot. A long page with a list of items to vote on, in German text.

Teaching Strategy

Facilitate thoughtful group discussions by having students first share their ideas in writing and with a partner.

Teaching Strategy

Encourage class participation and develop students’ active listening skills by reading aloud text excerpts.

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Gallery

Explore photographs of the everyday lives of European Jews living in shtetls and larger cities before World War II.

Shabbtai (Shepske) Sonenson takes one of the shtetl's Hebrew teachers for a ride on his new motorcycle.

Handout

Complete a Text-to-Text, Text-to-Self, Text-to-World activity using photographs of Jewish life in Europe before World War II.

Family portrait with children, parents, and grandparents. Taken circa 1930-1940.

Video

This short documentary captures the spirit of Jewish life in Warsaw, Poland, before World War II.

Video

This clip from "Sholem Aleichem: Laughing in the Darkness" covers the advantages and disadvantages of growing up in a shtetl as seen through Sholem Aleichem's story "The Town of the Little People." ).

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Teaching Strategy

Use this strategy to improve students’ reading skills and help them connect ideas in a text to their own lives, current events, and history.

A close-up of an open book in someone's hands

Teaching Strategy

Encourage all students to share their quick reactions to a question, topic, or text.

Reading

Read about the far-reaching efforts of Joseph Goebbels and the Ministry of Propaganda to generate enthusiasm for the Nazi party.

On the night of January 30, 1933, SA men paraded with torches through Berlin to celebrate Hitler’s appointment as chancellor.

Reading

Learn about the Nazis' boycott of Jewish-owned businesses, including a firsthand account from a German Jew.

SA members in 1933 stand in front of a barricaded Jewish shop, holding signs in both German and English urging the boycott of Jewish businesses.

Reading

Read a letter exchange between Adolf Hitler and President Paul von Hindenburg regarding a law that suspended Jews from positions of civil service in Nazi Germany.

Germans look on as the Reichstag building burns on February 27, 1933.

Reading

Consider the significance of the public burning of books deemed in Nazi Germany in 1933.

Students contribute anti-German books to be destroyed at a Berlin book-burning on May 10, 1933. About 40,000 people attended the event.

Reading

Find out how Hitler strengthened enforcement of Paragraph 175, a law that made homosexuality a crime in Germany.

Crackdown on Communists and Social Democrats: arrested in the SA-barracks on Friedrichstrasse, April, 1933

Reading

Learn about the roles of the the SA, the SS, and the Gestapo in Nazi Germany.

Reading

Discover the effects of the “Malicious Attacks” law, which criminalized dissent to the Nazi party, had on one German family and on German society as a whole.

Hitler Youth groups educated young people according to Nazi principles, and the encouraged comradeship and physical fitness through outdoor activities

Reading

Learn about the role of cell and block wardens, Germans who collected information about their neighbors in Nazi German society.

An issue of the antisemitic propaganda newspaper Der Stürmer (The Attacker) is posted on the sidewalk in Worms, Germany, in 1935. The headline above the case says, ""The Jews Are Our Misfortune.""

Video

Alfred Wolf, a Holocaust survivor from Eberbach, Germany, recalls the changes he noticed in Germany after the election of Adolf Hitler.

Video

Scholars Timothy Ryback, Wendy Lower, Jonathan Petropoulos, Michael Berenbaum, and Peter Hayes discuss Adolf Hitler’s final steps in securing total power in Germany.

Handout

Guide students' comprehension of a short documentary on the Nazis' rise to power.

Handout

Use this handout in a Stations activity that asks students to explore several aspects of life in the Weimar Republic.

Video

Author Timothy Ryback explains how, in 1933, four Jewish political prisoners at Dachau concentration camp became some of the first victims of Hitler and the Nazis.

Teaching Strategy

Use this discussion strategy to help students practice being contributors and listeners in a group conversation.

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Reading

Compare the text of Germany's original military oath with Hitler’s new oath, and consider the implications of the oath's promise of allegiance to a single leader.

Lesson

Students consider the choices and reasoning of individual Germans who stayed quiet or spoke up during the first few years of Nazi rule.

Reading

Read about two men's refusals to pledge their allegiance to the Nazis and the consequences they faced.

Reading

Explore bystander behavior, conformity, and obedience in a German college professor’s account of how he responded to Nazi policies and ideology.

Reading

Consider how the Nazis leveraged Hitler’s public image in their pursuit to transform German society according to Nazi ideology.

Teaching Strategy

Encourage class participation and develop students’ active listening skills by reading aloud text excerpts.

Teaching Strategy

Assess students’ understanding, monitor their questions, or gather feedback on your teaching by having them turn in exit cards.

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Teaching Strategy

Students compose poems using only words, phrases, or quotations from a text that they find meaningful.

Teaching Strategy

Have students facilitate a discussion in order to work together toward a shared understanding of a text.

Two students sitting in a classroom with one student talking and gesturing

Teaching Strategy

Educators will provide a creative way for students to engage with a text by transforming a line they find meaningful into a poem.

Teaching Strategy

This discussion strategy helps students practice being both active speakers and active listeners in a group conversation.

Four students sitting at a table with one student talking and gesturing.

Reading

Find out how one family's lives changed when Hitler passed the Nuremberg Laws in Nazi Germany.

This chart was designed to help Germans determine their racial status as outlined by the 1935 Nuremberg Laws.

Reading

Read the text of a widely distributed Nazi pamphlet that outlined National Socialism's central goals and defined what it meant to be German. This resource is in Spanish.

Leni Riefenstahl's documentary-style film Triumph of the Will glorified Hitler and the Nazi party. It was shot at the 1934 Nazi Party congress and rally in Nuremberg.

Reading

Learn about the sterilization law in Nazi Germany and other measures taken by the Nazis to ensure the purity of the Aryan race.

Reading

Review a list of anti-Jewish laws, policies, and decrees made in Nazi Germany in 1933.

Handout

Use this excerpt from the Nuremberg Laws in a Big Paper activity that will help students understand the role of laws in Nazi Germany.

In 1933, Jewish businessman Oskar Danker and his girlfriend, a Christian woman, were forced to carry signs discouraging Jewish-German integration. Intimate relationships between “true Germans” and Jews were outlawed by 1935.

Handout

Use this excerpt from the Nuremberg Laws in a Big Paper activity that will help students understand the role of laws in Nazi Germany.

Handout

Use this excerpt from the Nuremberg Laws in a Big Paper activity that will help students understand the role of laws in Nazi Germany.

Video

Third-grade teacher, Jane Elliott meets with her former class to discuss the experiment on discrimination she conducted 15 years earlier and the effects it had on their lives. She also gives the lesson to employees of the Iowa prison system.

Teaching Strategy

Facilitate thoughtful group discussions by having students first share their ideas in writing and with a partner.

Teaching Strategy

Students have a written conversation with peers and use silence as a tool to explore a topic in depth.

Group of students writing on large piece of chart paper.

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Teaching Strategy

Deepen students' understanding of a topic by having them connect to their prior knowledge.

Book

This resource provides writing prompts and strategies that align Holocaust and Human Behavior with the expectations of the Common Core State Standards.

Teaching Strategy

Students seek out and share ideas and information with classmates through this cooperative learning strategy.

Teaching Strategy

Assess students’ understanding, monitor their questions, or gather feedback on your teaching by having them turn in exit cards.

Reading

Get insight on the ability and limits of propaganda to influence the beliefs, feelings, and actions of those exposed to it.

Image

This 1938 poster advertises a popular antisemitic traveling exhibit called Der Ewige Jude (The Eternal Jew).

Poster

This mid-1930s poster says, “The NSDAP [Nazi Party] protects the people. Your fellow comrades need your advice and help, so join the local party organization.

Image

This 1935 poster promotes the Hitler Youth by stating: “Youth serves the Führer! All ten-year-olds into the Hitler Youth.”

Image

An illustration of children learning race science in school

A child in a classroom standing at the chalkboard demonstrating anti-semitic knowledge

Video

Journalist, lecturer, and author Adam Hochschild discusses the use of propaganda during World War I.

Gallery

Explore a curated selection of primary source propaganda images from Nazi Germany.

This 1934 propaganda poster in support of the National Welfare program reads: “National health, national community, child protection, protection of mothers, care for travelers, are the tasks of the NS-Welfare Service. Join now!”

Video

Jonathan Petropoulos discusses the importance of the German 1937 Degenerate Art exhibit.

Image

Leni Riefenstahl's documentary-style film glorified Hitler and the Nazi Party. It was shot at the 1934 Nazi Party congress and rally in Nuremberg.

Teaching Strategy

Facilitate thoughtful group discussions by having students first share their ideas in writing and with a partner.

Teaching Strategy

Help students interpret an image by “framing” smaller portions of the image and analyzing them.

An illustration with portions framed with post-its.

Teaching Strategy

Encourage class participation and develop students’ active listening skills by reading aloud text excerpts.

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Teaching Strategy

Deepen students' understanding of a topic by having them connect to their prior knowledge.

Teaching Strategy

Teach your students to become critical viewers of film with this four-step procedure.

Teaching Strategy

Get all students involved by asking them to show their stance on a statement through their positioning around the room.

Teaching Strategy

Students have a written conversation with peers and use silence as a tool to explore a topic in depth.

Teaching Strategy

Deepen students' understanding of a topic by having them connect to their prior knowledge.

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Reading

Consider how conformity, obedience, and desire for belonging influenced the attitudes and values of youth in Nazi Germany.

A crowd salutes Nazi Leader Adolf Hitler outside the Reich Chancellery in Berlin after a plebiscite, which gave Hitler absolute power as German Fuhrer. August 19, 1934.

Reading

Reflect on the true story of a father who dared to challenge the education his children received in Nazi Germany.

Reading

Gain insight into the pressures that compelled young people and their families to support Nazi youth organizations with this story about a member of the Hitler Youth.

Handout

Use these statements about the role of youth in society to complete a Four Corners activity.

A group of boys in Hitler Youth uniforms walk through a field

Video

Kurt Klein, who emigrated from Walldorf, Germany, to the United States in 1937, recalls how Nazi policies and propaganda affected his life at school.

Video

Ellen Kerry Davis, a Jewish woman originally from Hoof, Germany, describes how her family’s friendships were impacted by Nazi rule.

Handout

Have students read and annotate passages on the experiences of youth in Nazi Germany.

Handout

Have students read and annotate passages on the experiences of youth in Nazi Germany.

Reading

Learn what incited Kristallnacht and get insight into the experiences of Jews in Germany on the night of horrendous violence in November 1938

Jewish men are arrested by the SS during Kristallnacht in Baden-Baden, Germany, and forced to march through the streets to a nearby synagogue to see it destroyed.

Reading

Examine firsthand reports of the theft committed against Jews during the chaos and violence of Kristallnacht.

What remained of the synagogue in Dortmund, Germany, after the Kristallnacht pogrom in November 1938.

Reading

Learn about a family who assisted their Jewish neighbors after Kristallnacht, and the consequences they faced for this decision to help.

Pedestrians in front of the demolished businesses of Jewish residents on Potsdamer St., Berlin. November 10, 1938.

Reading

Read a report from the disciplinary hearing of a German college student who chose to help his Jewish neighbors after Kristallnacht.

The German military parades through Vienna on March 15, 1938, after the Anschluss.

Reading

Consider a Swiss merchant’s account of how his German colleagues responded to the events of Kristallnacht.

Reading

Consider how leaders like FDR, clergy members, and ordinary people around the world responded to the news of Kristallnacht.

In the Chicago Daily News, November 23, 1938, the cartoonist Cecil Jensen pleaded for world leaders to help Europe’s Jews.

Reading

Explore bystander behavior and the challenges of speaking up with Maurice Ogden's poem “The Hangman.”

Passengers aboard the St. Louis, seeking refugee from Nazi-occupied Europe, wait to find out if they will be allowed entry into Cuba in June 1939.

Reading

A translation of a telegram sent from Reinhard Heydrich, Major General of the SS, on November 10, 1938, that instructed local German officers on how to carry out the anti-Jewish measures that became known as Kristallnacht.

Video

Scholars discuss the events of Kristallnacht, a series of violent attacks against Jews in Germany, Austria, and part of Czechoslovakia in November, 1938.

Handout

Use this handout to help students record notes for the film, "Kristallnacht": The November 1938 Pogroms.

Image showing the destruction resulting from Kristallnacht.

Video

Holocaust survivor Elsbeth Lewin describes her and her family's experience of Kristallnacht in Mainz, Germany.

Handout

Help students analyze a reading about the choices made by a person or group during Kristallnacht.

Handout

Students predict the definitions of perpetrator, victim, bystander, and upstander, using context clues.

Teaching Strategy

Deepen students' understanding of a topic by having them connect to their prior knowledge.

Teaching Strategy

Facilitate thoughtful group discussions by having students first share their ideas in writing and with a partner.

Teaching Strategy

Encourage all students to share their quick reactions to a question, topic, or text.

Teaching Strategy

Assess students’ understanding, monitor their questions, or gather feedback on your teaching by having them turn in exit cards.

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Teaching Strategy

Use this strategy to improve students’ reading skills and help them connect ideas in a text to their own lives, current events, and history.

Reading

Examine a 1938 poll that reveals the public opinion in the United States toward the Jewish refugee crisis.

Reading

Learn about the conference called by FDR in 1938 to discuss the growing Jewish refugee crisis.

Reading

Consider how leaders like FDR, clergy members, and ordinary people around the world responded to the news of Kristallnacht.

Reading

Consider the connection between the refugee crisis facing Europe in 2016 and the aftermath of World War II and the Holocaust.

This Berlin, Germany, memorial was designed by Dani Karavan and opened in 2012. The triangular stone at the center of the pool holds a fresh flower which is replaced every day.

Video

Holocaust survivor Sol Messinger describes his experiences attempting to emigrate from Germany to Cuba in 1939 aboard the ship the M.S. St. Louis.

Video

Vera Gissing, a Holocaust survivor from Czechoslovakia, recalls how her family prepared her for the Kindertransport, a rescue mission that brought thousands of Jewish refugee children to Great Britain.

Video

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This episode of The American Experience examines the role of the United States in the Holocaust, exploring such issues as American antisemitism and the deliberate suppression of information that European Jews were slated for genocide.

Chapter

Consider the dilemmas faced by world leaders as Nazi Germany began taking aggressive action against neighboring countries and individuals in the late 1930s.

Teaching Strategy

Structure an active class discussion in which students express their opinions by standing along a continuum.

Students discussing in pairs facing each other

Teaching Strategy

Students will become “experts” on a topic and then share their new knowledge with peers.

Teaching Strategy

Use this quick way for students to demonstrate their engagement with a text, image, or video by having them identify what they find surprising, interesting, and troubling.

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Teaching Strategy

Deepen students' understanding of a topic by having them connect to their prior knowledge.

Reading

Learn about the Nazis’ plan to rearrange the population of Poland, which resulted in the displacement of more than a million ethnic Poles and Jews.

An exhibit at a Berlin school persuades Germans to help colonize the Warthegau area of Poland. The exhibit says “The land calls you!,” and the painting shows a settler’s car passing by a Polish border sign that has been knocked down.

Reading

Consider what German citizens thought of Hitler's plan to colonize Poland through these reflections from a member of the League of German Girls and two German soldiers.

After Germany conquered the Warthegau region of Poland, members of the League of German Girls moved there to help colonize and spread German culture.

Reading

Examine how Nazi Germany's army targeted both the Polish army and the people of Poland as it waged war.

The Jewish population in Poland being "resettled" by German soldiers, circa 1940-41.

Reading

Learn how the Nazis imposed their racial hierarchy on the people of Poland during the German occupation.

German troops parade past the Arc de Triomphe in Paris after they occupied the city in June 1940.

Reading

Learn about the Nazis’ medical killing program that was responsible for the murder of mentally and physically disabled people during World War II.

Reading

Consider why the residents of Hartheim kept silent about the evidence of mass murder they witnessed in their town throughout World War II.

Jews wearing Star of David badges in the Lódz ghetto. Established in 1940, the Germans crowded 160,000 Jews from the Polish city, more than a third of its population, into the ghetto.

Reading

Explore the stories of three German ministers who chose to speak out against the Nazis’ "euthanasia" program.

Video

Scholar Doris Bergen discusses the ideologies of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis.

Map

Between 1933 and 1939, Greater Germany expanded significantly as a result of the Third Reich’s annexations and conquests in eastern Europe.

Map showing territory conquered, annexed, and remilitarized by Nazi Germany between 1933 and 1939.

Image

After Germany conquered the Warthegau region of Poland, members of the League of German Girls moved there to help colonize and spread German culture.

Image

This photograph shows Polish Jews who were expelled from their homes in Germany by the Nazis 1938.

A crowd of people outside surrounded by their suitcases and other belongings

Image

An exhibit at a Berlin school persuades Germans to help colonize the Warthegau area of Poland. The exhibit says “The land calls you!,” and the painting shows a settler’s car passing by a Polish border sign that has been knocked down.

Video

Scholar Doris Bergen discusses Bishop von Galen and his opposition to the Nazi T4 euthanasia program.

Teaching Strategy

Use this quick way for students to demonstrate their engagement with a text, image, or video by having them identify what they find surprising, interesting, and troubling.

Teaching Strategy

This discussion strategy helps students practice being both active speakers and active listeners in a group conversation.

Teaching Strategy

Support students’ tracking of new or important vocabulary by displaying these words in a shared space in the classroom.

Reading

Begin your study of the Holocaust with a poem by Holocaust survivor Sonia Weitz.

A crowd of women and children, some with Stars of David patches on their clothing.

Reading

Diary entries from a Jewish woman imprisoned in Bergen-Belsen shed light on how prisoners in camps and ghettos were deprived of dignity.

A memorial at Auschwitz of shoes taken from prisoners of the camp.

Reading

Learn about the Oyneg Shabes, a group in the Warsaw ghetto that documented Nazi crimes and the daily lives of the ghetto's residents.

Collection

Engage students in personal accounts from survivors with this collection of video testimony, survivor profiles, and a lesson plan.

Holocaust Survivor Barbara Fischman shares her testimony.

Reading

Consider the experiences of Jewish prisoners who were forced to help German guards murder other prisoners.

Three members of the Jewish Fighting Organization caught after the Warsaw ghetto uprising.

Reading

Learn about the largest act of resistance by Jews against the Nazis, mounted by prisoners of the Warsaw ghetto.

Jewish resistance fighters who fought against the SS and German army during the Warsaw ghetto uprising between April 19 and May 16, 1943, are captured.

Unit

Explore the stories of Jewish partisans that stood against Nazi oppression, genocide, and antisemitism during World War II.

Russian partisans, one of them photographer Faye Schulman, gathering together in the forest, Naliboki Forest, Belarus, December 1944. The Molotava Brigade was a partisan group made up mostly of escaped Soviet Army POWs. The woman pictured is Faye Schulman, a Jewish woman who fled into the Naliboki forest with her camera equipment and joined the Molotova Brigade. For two years in the forest she photographed the partisan's activities, worked as medical aid and participated in the partisans raid's.

Video

Scholar Doris Bergen describes the phases of events that led to the Holocaust.

Handout

Help students understand the four major stages of the Holocaust according to scholar Doris Bergen.

Nazi officers stand guard and march at Wawel Castle in Krakow, Poland.

Video

In his testimony for USC Shoah Foundation, Holocaust survivor Jack Arnel describes what he saw as a 12-year-old when the Nazis occupied Vilna, Lithuania in 1941.

Map

This map shows the locations of the largest Jewish ghettos.

This map shows the locations of the largest ghettos.

Map

Between 1933 and 1945, the Nazis established more than 40,000 camps for the imprisonment, forced labor, or mass killing of Jews, Sinti and Roma, Communists, and other so-called “enemies of the state."

Map with locations of main camps and killing sites across Europe during the Nazi era.

Image

Seven year old boy Tsvi Nussbaum holds his hands up in Warsaw, 1943.

Handout

Allow students to reflect on a range of experiences and stories from the Holocaust in a Big Paper silent discussion.

Photo of Nazi troops invading Prague during Germany's armed forces parade in 1939.

Handout

Allow students to reflect on a range of experiences and stories from the Holocaust in a Big Paper silent discussion.

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Materials for Teaching Holocaust and Human Behavior

At a Glance

Language

Subject

Grade

Overview

About This Collection

Inside This Collection

Materials for Teaching Holocaust and Human Behavior

At a Glance

Language

Subject

Grade

Overview

About This Collection

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Inside This Collection

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Contracting

Journals in a Facing History Classroom

Word Wall

Common Core Writing Prompts and Strategies: Holocaust and Human Behavior

Lesson 1: Introduction to the Unit

Letter to Students

Letter to Parents and Guardians

Classroom Experience Checklist

Sample Facing History Classroom Expectations

Read Aloud

Journals in a Facing History Classroom

Lesson 2: Exploring Identity

Words Matter

Finding Confidence

Finding One's Voice

Gender and Identity

Being Jewish in the United States

The Individual and Society

Identity Charts

Jigsaw: Developing Community and Disseminating Knowledge

Word Wall

Read Aloud

Lesson 3: Stereotypes and "Single Stories"

The Danger of a Single Story

The Danger of a Single Story

Little Things Are Big

The Danger of a Single Story Viewing/Reading Guide

Street Calculus

Text-to-Text, Text-to-Self, Text-to-World

Concept Maps: Generate, Sort, Connect, Elaborate

Think, Pair, Share

Concentric Circles

Wraparound

Word Wall

Lesson 4: Universe of Obligation

Universe of Obligation

We and They

What Do We Do with a Difference?

Understanding Strangers

Universe of Obligation

Think, Pair, Share

Word Wall

Unit Assessment: Step 1

Common Core Writing Prompts and Strategies: Holocaust and Human Behavior

Anticipation Guides

Four Corners

Think, Pair, Share

Exit Cards

Dissecting the Prompt

Lesson 5: The Concept of Race

Growing Up with Racism

Preparing Students for Difficult Conversations

What Do We Do with a Difference?

Which One of These Things Is Not Like the Others?

Race: The Power of an Illusion (The Difference Between Us)

Race and Racism

A Class Divided

We and They

3-2-1

Exit Cards

Word Wall

Lesson 6: The Roots and Impact of Antisemitism

“We Don’t Control America” and Other Myths, Part 1

“We Don’t Control America” and Other Myths, Part 2

“We Don’t Control America” and Other Myths, Part 3

Anti-Judaism before the Enlightenment

From Religious Prejudice to Antisemitism

Overview of Anti-Judaism and Antisemitism

The Ancient Roots of Anti-Judaism

Antisemitism from the Enlightenment to World War I