Yesterday was our final full day in Poland and we spent the early afternoon exploring the Warsaw Rising Museum. We had read about this museum on another teacher's blog and knew it would be relevant to our research and exploration here in Poland. The museum focused on how the people of Warsaw responded to various efforts of the Germans (and initially the Soviets too) to begin eradicating their presence in the country and ultimately in the continent.
The most fascinating part of the museum was a special exhibit in the basement where replicas of the Warsaw sewer system have been created. In the early '40s, the Germans began forcing all Jewish people into ghettos within their own cities. Over 600 ghettos were created in Poland, most enclosed by high brick walls, wooden fences or barbed wire. The purpose was to cram Jews into tiny spaces where the S.S. could then impose harsh restrictions on their freedoms. For example, food rations were established and they were given fewer calories each day than are necessary to maintain a healthy existence; this was done to intentionally cause sickness and disease which could then lead to mass deaths in the ghetto. As Jews were living in the Warsaw Ghetto, one of the largest in Poland, they used the 25-mile-long sewer tunnel system to move about the city undetected, finding food and other supplies and sending messages to friends and family in other parts of the city. The replicas in the museum gave us the opportunity to walk through these small tunnels. Immediately upon entering, I was struck by how claustrophobic I felt in these small spaces. The size of the real sewers in the city range from a manageable size of 6 feet by 7 feet down to a very cramped and tight 2 feet x 3.5 feet. The labyrinth of replicas we walked through gradually got smaller and narrower, as we were given a very small taste of what it would have been like to crawl through such small, dark and undoubtedly dirty sewers.
The museum primarily focused on the resistance of the population of Poland to Nazi occupation and the uprising in the Warsaw ghetto and rising of Warsaw. As we walked through the museum, we read about various groups that resisted the Nazis in different ways. When the Nazis invaded and took over Warsaw, their goal was to eradicate Polish culture. Immediately street names were changed, and the teaching of Polish literature, history, and culture was banned in schools and universities. Because of these new laws, teaching these subjects became one of the main ways of fighting the Nazi occupation. Teachers within Poland responded by creating the Secret Teachers Organization in October of 1939 and taught clandestine study groups these subjects throughout the war. During the 1943-1944 school year 5,500 teachers were teaching roughly 90,000 students.
While learning about Nazi Germany and the ways in which the S.S. and Hitler tried to destroy the culture of Jews and of Poland, it has become evident that the first attacks were on the intellectuals, so reading about the teachers of Poland and their resistance was very inspiring. We have all discussed why we became teachers and a huge part of our choices were wanting to pass on knowledge, wanting to make our students really think and question the world, and wanting to build relationships with them to help them be better human beings. It's clear that the teachers of Poland rose to the challenge of their circumstances for similar reasons, and I find it truly amazing that they continued teaching despite the danger.
Near the end of our tour at the museum, we stumbled upon a dark, curtained off exhibit, made to feel like we were navigating our way through a dark alley. At the end of this "alley" a Polish man was describing his experience during the Warsaw rising. The part that stuck out to me was when he described his experience with hand-to-hand combat. He prefaced his story with the idea that in such a fight, one must live and one must die. There's no other option, only this. Then, pointing to his neck, he recounted the moment he killed his opponent during the battle. The Polish man said he survived only because he was one second quicker than his Nazi counterpart. After a pause, he said this Nazi man was the most beautiful person in the entire world and that he would never forget him. "The most beautiful person in the world," he repeated then stopped and paused for a while, lost in the memory of the past.
The Polish man reminds me of Vladek (the main character from Maus) as he tells his son about the Nazi man HE had killed during combat at the beginning of the war. He tells of how he stumbled upon the man by chance, shot him, and killed him, reacting before he fell victim to the same fate. After that battle and after being captured by the Nazis, Vladek told the German officers where the man's body lay since it was separated from the others. In class, I ask the students to explain why Vladek does this and to talk about what he may have been feeling and/or why he went out of his way to report where the man's body lay. Every semester, a couple students are able to articulate the mixed emotions Vladek may have felt as he was forced to kill a very real and threatening enemy who was also a fellow man.
When we discuss war, we tend to rely on the safety of statistics when discussing casualties. However, in both of these situations, the casualties are individualized and humanized into one: one man caught in the moment with his one life hanging in the moment of luck and instinctive reaction. One man lost his life, a small number lost in overwhelming statistics, and another man took that life, carrying that memory, the burden of taking that one life from his fellow man. The Polish man in the video (and Vladek, too, in my opinion) recognized this.
When I discuss this with my students, I struggle to understand the weight of such of burden. And, I wonder, how can I help my students understand something that I myself struggle to comprehend? This Polish man (and Vladek) give a voice and a face to the cold facts written on the pages of history books and literature.
Monday, July 6, 2015
Sunday, July 5, 2015
Day 4 - Warsaw
(Beth) Today was our first day in Warsaw and held some unexpected surprises. Our first stop was the Gestapo Headquarters Museum at the Department of Education in the government district, but after wandering around the block for about ten minutes, we finally found the entrance and were stonewalled by a sign indicating that the museum was closed for construction. We found another museum to explore instead: the Museum of the History of Polish Jews (POLIN) with a special exhibit exploring the cultural history going back for a thousand years. The exhibit was far more extensive than anything we were expecting.
The first section of the exhibit included ancient texts dating back to the eleventh century, describing how the Jews came to settle in Poland. Since the beginning, the Jewish people documented needing the king’s protection through centuries of conflict against Christians. Each year students have asked me why the Nazis targeted the Jews, baffled and unable to grasp WHY. My response to their questions always addresses the social, political, and economic effects of World War I, focusing primarily on effect in Germany. But after spending several hours exploring this exhibit, I will be able to explain the anti-semitism preceding the Holocaust for a thousand years. Many of the Jews left Germany centuries before the Holocaust to escape persecution. What they found in Poland was far better than what they experienced in Germany, but the conflict between the Jews and Christians was always present, at times extremely violent. The anti-semitism of the Holocaust was more than just a post-World War I German problem, and I realized how much I have been naively oversimplifying this for my students. It’s so much more complicated than even a small museum exhibit could capture.
(Allyson) One aspect that I found troubling at the museum was how quickly the German occupants in Poland began limiting the freedoms of the Jewish people in Poland. We saw several notices that had been published by Germans and distributed throughout Poland dating back to the late 1930s regarding the need for Jewish people to register themselves, begin “bowing down” to German authorities, and keep curfew hours. For example, in April of 1940 a notice was sent throughout Poland stating that the German population curfew was 11:30pm, the Polish population curfew was 10:30pm, and the Jewish population curfew was 9:00pm. Remembering that these curfews were set in Poland were astounding. Germans, the “outsiders” in the country, retained the most freedom, whereas the freedom of the Polish and Jewish members of the communities was severely hindered. Once these freedoms began being restricted, it was only a matter of time before ghettos were created, and eventually concentration camps were formed.
As today is the 4th of July, this concept of freedom stuck with me this evening. It’s impossible to read the news these days without encountering some sort of debate regarding what constitutes “basic human rights” and what it means to have freedom… of choice, of religion, of who to marry, etc. As I tend to be someone who doesn’t like having strong opinions on politics, I couldn’t help but think about how learning about this time in history will impact my current views of what’s going on in our world.
(Ashley) While walking through the exhibit, it was extremely apparent how the passive actions or rather inaction of many led to the Holocaust. It only took a few Nazi leaders to set up death camps like Auschwitz, but it took the inaction of millions to allow those few leaders to succeed in decimating the Jewish population. After progressing through the years of 1939-1945, we went through the rooms relating to the 50s, 60s, 70s, and 80s. However, despite the Holocaust, the anti-semitism hasn’t stopped. Jews were still persecuted and many of those who tried to return home after surviving the Holocaust, were murdered for attempting to reclaim their homes. Or they were driven out of their home country and were denied visas into others such as the USA. We saw newspapers revealing that a ship with Jewish immigrants to the UK was denied and bounced around until they were sent back to Germany of all places! It was extremely disheartening to see that the world didn’t respond with compassion after such an awful atrocity, but instead continued with the hatred from the past.
At the end of the exhibit, there were videos showing changes in Poland and how anti-semitism was fought in the 90s and 2000s, which gave me a little hope. But, after we left the museum and were exiting the subway station, I noticed that the man in front of me on the escalator had a swastika tattoo on his ankle. I actually gasped when I saw it. After everything we have seen in the last 3 days, that sight was truly nauseating and only highlighted that anti-semitism is still a problem and that passivity isn’t an option.
Friday, July 3, 2015
Day 3 - Sosnowiec & Lodz
Today we rented a car and drove to Warsaw. Rather than taking a train, we wanted the freedom of exploring the Polish countryside by automobile. Our first stop was Sosnowiec, Vladek Spiegelman's hometown. Vladek is one of the main characters in Maus and much of the first volume of the graphic novel takes place here. We didn't stop for long, but we wanted to take pictures of the city to share with our students as we read. Our second stop was Lodz, to visit the remains and memorial to the Litzmannstadt Ghetto, the second largest ghetto in World War II, established for Jews and Roma gypsies. As we drove from Krakow to Sosnowiec and on toward Lodz, I (Beth) stared out the backseat window, thinking about what it would have been like to be wandering through the Polish hills and forests searching for a place to hide, wondering if the Poles in the house across the field would take me in or turn me away. I wondered what fear the Polish Jews such as Vladek must have experienced as they wandered their homeland, fearing for their lives. I pictured the faces of all the Auschwitz prisoners in those pictures we had seen over the past two days, wondering what they survived and wondering what they didn't survive.
While we were in Lodz, we visited Survivor's Park which contains a memorial to those who helped Jews survive during the Holocaust. It was nice to see so many names, especially after being presented with the evil humans are capable of over the last two days. Outside the memorial there was a copy of a notice posted by the Nazis in cities such as Lodz that stated anyone caught helping Jews would be executed, along with their entire family. It was amazing to see how many people chose that risk in order to help their friends and neighbors. However, it is also apparent how many were afraid to do so, which is completely understandable, but I kept thinking about how important it is that we teach our students to be human beings that stand against injustice in our world.
We experienced a long day of driving and were tired at the end when we finally reached Warsaw, and I couldn't help but recognize my comfort and privilege, freely traveling across a foreign continent with nothing more than a language barrier in my way.
SIDENOTE: Thanks to my Aunt Judy, I (Allyson) recently heard about a man named Sir Nicholas Winton who helped save 669 Jewish children during WWII. When it became clear that Jewish people were in danger, he set about arranging homes in Britain for these Czechoslovakian children to find refuge in, ultimately saving them from what would most likely have been a dire fate. There's an amazing clip found here that shows some of these children meeting Sir Nicholas decades later. The author of the article writes, "We often ask why, during times of war, did people not intervene? The truth is most of us do not stir ourselves to act. We know of suffering in the world and yet continue to live our lives, go to work, take care of our families, and sleep in peace." As we continue on this learning journey, I am trying to continue asking myself that difficult yet vital question, and attempting to answer it - how am I being stirred to act?
While we were in Lodz, we visited Survivor's Park which contains a memorial to those who helped Jews survive during the Holocaust. It was nice to see so many names, especially after being presented with the evil humans are capable of over the last two days. Outside the memorial there was a copy of a notice posted by the Nazis in cities such as Lodz that stated anyone caught helping Jews would be executed, along with their entire family. It was amazing to see how many people chose that risk in order to help their friends and neighbors. However, it is also apparent how many were afraid to do so, which is completely understandable, but I kept thinking about how important it is that we teach our students to be human beings that stand against injustice in our world.
We experienced a long day of driving and were tired at the end when we finally reached Warsaw, and I couldn't help but recognize my comfort and privilege, freely traveling across a foreign continent with nothing more than a language barrier in my way.
SIDENOTE: Thanks to my Aunt Judy, I (Allyson) recently heard about a man named Sir Nicholas Winton who helped save 669 Jewish children during WWII. When it became clear that Jewish people were in danger, he set about arranging homes in Britain for these Czechoslovakian children to find refuge in, ultimately saving them from what would most likely have been a dire fate. There's an amazing clip found here that shows some of these children meeting Sir Nicholas decades later. The author of the article writes, "We often ask why, during times of war, did people not intervene? The truth is most of us do not stir ourselves to act. We know of suffering in the world and yet continue to live our lives, go to work, take care of our families, and sleep in peace." As we continue on this learning journey, I am trying to continue asking myself that difficult yet vital question, and attempting to answer it - how am I being stirred to act?
Thursday, July 2, 2015
Day 2 - Auschwitz-Birkenau
We are writing this blog post on the bus ride from Oswiecim to Krakow after another emotional and impactful day at Auschwitz and Auschwitz II-Birkenau. Our morning began with another guided tour with our same guide from yesterday, David. He was an unending bank of knowledge for us and we're so grateful to have had him guide us through the two camps these past couple days.
David picked us up at our hotel this morning and took us to Auschwitz II-Birkenau. Birkenau is located just over a mile from Auschwitz. This is the largest of all concentration camps in Europe; over 1 million Jews were killed within its borders. 90,000 prisoners were held at Birkenau at any given time, and plans had been made for expanding it prior to its liberation.
When we first arrived, we climbed the guard tower at the front of the camp, where we could look over the expanse and see what remains of buildings, guard towers, gas chambers and crematoria, and the railroad tracks leading directly into the camp through the main gate. Inside the watch tower were some photographs taken of recent prisoners arriving on the train in 1944 and disembarking onto the train platform within the walls of the camp. I was struck by the lack of panic or concern on their faces and asked David why they looked so placid. He said that the arriving prisoners would have had no idea that they were arriving to a camp which housed five enormous gas chambers and crematoria, and instead were told lies about what the next couple hours would hold. In reality, 75% of all prisoners arriving to Birkenau were immediately sent to the gas chambers. Seventy-five percent. This number was overwhelming and as I looked at the faces in the photograph, I could easily imagine my family's faces instead. If my family had been arriving, three of the four of us would have immediately been sent to our death, not knowing that was what lay ahead but instead believing, as we clutched hands, held our few personal belongings close and walked in a mass towards the gas chambers, that we were being taken to warm showers after a long and crowded train ride. This realization today struck me as I continued to try and process the senselessness of what happened in these concentration camps.
As we walked through Birkenau, I couldn't help but be shocked by the sheer size of the camp. The camp can only be described as vast and knowing what happened there only made its size seem more immense. We walked passed guard towers, barracks, man-made ponds, and other buildings toward the back of the camp where the crematoriums and sauna stand. The crematoriums came first. These structures are currently in ruins as the Nazis destroyed them with dynamite on January 18, 1945. Millions of people died and were burned in these buildings with their ashes spread in the forest beyond. Despite the awful actions that occurred in these buildings, I was struck by the beautiful trees they were surrounded by that were planted in a perfect line. I asked our tour guide, David, if the trees were planted after the war, and he said no. The trees were planted during the construction of the camp to "beautify" it and to help convince the victims that Auschwitz-Birkenau was an "innocent" place. The S.S. truly thought of everything.
After we had examined the ruins of crematoriums I and II, we walked through the portion of the camp known as "Canada." This is the area where those who survived the S.S. selections were sent to be processed and were taken to what is known as the sauna. These people were taken here to be stripped of their belongings, shaven, disinfected, tattooed, and to receive camp attire. Their belongings were stored in warehouses which were set on fire before the camp was liberated. This area was also near crematoriums 4 and 5. Because prisoners waited here both to be processed and to be sent to the gas chambers the land is saturated with small artifacts that resurface as the ground shifts and the soil is disrupted by people and the weather. Our tour guide told us about a trunk found buried in this area filled with family photographs. Some of these photographs were labelled and have enabled the museum to identify some of the victims and give them a face and a story. Unfortunately, the vast majority of those who perished at Auschwitz are unknown, so this was an extraordinary find. We walked through the sauna to see where the victims were processed, and in the final room we were able to see the photographs that were found in the trunk. The photos contained images of families, friends, weddings, and other family occasions. Some of the photos revealed their subject's personalities consisting of silly faces, artistic selfies, serious postures, and candid moments. Looking at all of the images, I couldn't help but think of my own family photos and special moments. I thought of all of the people that are in those photos with me. My husband, my brother, and father, and mother. My grandparents. The people in those photographs loved each other and tried to save a piece of their lives by burying their photos in the camp grounds. I was sad to see them but happy that the museum found them, because visitors like us get to see these people as more than just prisoners of Auschwitz.
As we left the sauna, I was again struck by all of the nature around us, and the fact that there were thousands of visitors at Auschwitz to be seen in the distance, yet it was silent. It was a comfort to know that those that died in the crematorium just meters away and those in the photographs at least have a peaceful place to rest.
We spent our afternoon participating in a workshop and lecture designed for students. The first workshop addressed complex frequently asked questions that many people have after touring the camps. Our instructor assigned each of us 2 questions, and in order to answer the questions we watched videos of various experts sharing their answers to those question. Our assigned questions covered a variety of topics:
- Where was God during the Holocaust?
- Why didn't the Allies bomb Auschwitz?
- What happened to the concepts of good and evil after the Holocaust?
- Could Auschwitz and the Holocaust have happened without Hitler?
- How did ordinary people respond to the persecution and murder of the Jews?
- Could Jews and other victims have escaped their fate?
Responders ranged from professors to rabbis to survivors to historians. After watching all the videos, each of us shared what we learned and discussed the complexities within each response and the differences in perspective, what was said and what was not said.
As we walked to our final lecture about survivors and history of the camp, we discussed how we could re-create something like this in our own classrooms, without access to the same resources. We wonder how we can get our own students to think about the questions and how we can expose them to a variety of responses using documents and videos already available in the States. We want our students to read Maus and discuss more than just the theme statements and literary elements that prove those themes. We want them to engage in understanding the true and complicated experiences behind the text. This is our challenge.
David picked us up at our hotel this morning and took us to Auschwitz II-Birkenau. Birkenau is located just over a mile from Auschwitz. This is the largest of all concentration camps in Europe; over 1 million Jews were killed within its borders. 90,000 prisoners were held at Birkenau at any given time, and plans had been made for expanding it prior to its liberation.
When we first arrived, we climbed the guard tower at the front of the camp, where we could look over the expanse and see what remains of buildings, guard towers, gas chambers and crematoria, and the railroad tracks leading directly into the camp through the main gate. Inside the watch tower were some photographs taken of recent prisoners arriving on the train in 1944 and disembarking onto the train platform within the walls of the camp. I was struck by the lack of panic or concern on their faces and asked David why they looked so placid. He said that the arriving prisoners would have had no idea that they were arriving to a camp which housed five enormous gas chambers and crematoria, and instead were told lies about what the next couple hours would hold. In reality, 75% of all prisoners arriving to Birkenau were immediately sent to the gas chambers. Seventy-five percent. This number was overwhelming and as I looked at the faces in the photograph, I could easily imagine my family's faces instead. If my family had been arriving, three of the four of us would have immediately been sent to our death, not knowing that was what lay ahead but instead believing, as we clutched hands, held our few personal belongings close and walked in a mass towards the gas chambers, that we were being taken to warm showers after a long and crowded train ride. This realization today struck me as I continued to try and process the senselessness of what happened in these concentration camps.
As we walked through Birkenau, I couldn't help but be shocked by the sheer size of the camp. The camp can only be described as vast and knowing what happened there only made its size seem more immense. We walked passed guard towers, barracks, man-made ponds, and other buildings toward the back of the camp where the crematoriums and sauna stand. The crematoriums came first. These structures are currently in ruins as the Nazis destroyed them with dynamite on January 18, 1945. Millions of people died and were burned in these buildings with their ashes spread in the forest beyond. Despite the awful actions that occurred in these buildings, I was struck by the beautiful trees they were surrounded by that were planted in a perfect line. I asked our tour guide, David, if the trees were planted after the war, and he said no. The trees were planted during the construction of the camp to "beautify" it and to help convince the victims that Auschwitz-Birkenau was an "innocent" place. The S.S. truly thought of everything.
After we had examined the ruins of crematoriums I and II, we walked through the portion of the camp known as "Canada." This is the area where those who survived the S.S. selections were sent to be processed and were taken to what is known as the sauna. These people were taken here to be stripped of their belongings, shaven, disinfected, tattooed, and to receive camp attire. Their belongings were stored in warehouses which were set on fire before the camp was liberated. This area was also near crematoriums 4 and 5. Because prisoners waited here both to be processed and to be sent to the gas chambers the land is saturated with small artifacts that resurface as the ground shifts and the soil is disrupted by people and the weather. Our tour guide told us about a trunk found buried in this area filled with family photographs. Some of these photographs were labelled and have enabled the museum to identify some of the victims and give them a face and a story. Unfortunately, the vast majority of those who perished at Auschwitz are unknown, so this was an extraordinary find. We walked through the sauna to see where the victims were processed, and in the final room we were able to see the photographs that were found in the trunk. The photos contained images of families, friends, weddings, and other family occasions. Some of the photos revealed their subject's personalities consisting of silly faces, artistic selfies, serious postures, and candid moments. Looking at all of the images, I couldn't help but think of my own family photos and special moments. I thought of all of the people that are in those photos with me. My husband, my brother, and father, and mother. My grandparents. The people in those photographs loved each other and tried to save a piece of their lives by burying their photos in the camp grounds. I was sad to see them but happy that the museum found them, because visitors like us get to see these people as more than just prisoners of Auschwitz.
As we left the sauna, I was again struck by all of the nature around us, and the fact that there were thousands of visitors at Auschwitz to be seen in the distance, yet it was silent. It was a comfort to know that those that died in the crematorium just meters away and those in the photographs at least have a peaceful place to rest.
We spent our afternoon participating in a workshop and lecture designed for students. The first workshop addressed complex frequently asked questions that many people have after touring the camps. Our instructor assigned each of us 2 questions, and in order to answer the questions we watched videos of various experts sharing their answers to those question. Our assigned questions covered a variety of topics:
- Where was God during the Holocaust?
- Why didn't the Allies bomb Auschwitz?
- What happened to the concepts of good and evil after the Holocaust?
- Could Auschwitz and the Holocaust have happened without Hitler?
- How did ordinary people respond to the persecution and murder of the Jews?
- Could Jews and other victims have escaped their fate?
Responders ranged from professors to rabbis to survivors to historians. After watching all the videos, each of us shared what we learned and discussed the complexities within each response and the differences in perspective, what was said and what was not said.
As we walked to our final lecture about survivors and history of the camp, we discussed how we could re-create something like this in our own classrooms, without access to the same resources. We wonder how we can get our own students to think about the questions and how we can expose them to a variety of responses using documents and videos already available in the States. We want our students to read Maus and discuss more than just the theme statements and literary elements that prove those themes. We want them to engage in understanding the true and complicated experiences behind the text. This is our challenge.
Wednesday, July 1, 2015
Day One - Auschwitz
Five months ago, we three English teachers from Mounds View High School applied for a grant through an organization called Fund for Teachers. The purpose of our grant proposal was to visit Poland (specifically, a couple important sites from the Holocaust) to better help our students develop empathy. We all teach the graphic novels Maus and Maus II by Art Spiegelman to our freshman classes, and we have struggled in the past to help students connect to the events he writes about. This was the core of our grant proposal: learning how to help students empathize.
Three months ago, we found out our grant was chosen and that we were being given the opportunity to travel to Europe this summer! Flights and hotels were booked, tours and workshops were scheduled, and a countdown was started for the number of days remaining until we’d embark on our journey.
A week ago, we left the great Midwest to embark on our summer journey, beginning with some personal travel. In the last week, we’ve visited Giant’s Causeway and various pubs in Ireland, we biked around Old Town Square and toured a castle in Prague, and yesterday, we arrived to Krakow, Poland, ready for our fellowship to officially begin.
This morning, we walked under the gate at Auschwitz, a gate that proclaims “Arbeit Macht Frei” - “Work Sets You Free.” The experience was surreal; as the sun rose higher in the sky illuminating the grounds, it was on one hand difficult to imagine the horrors that took place within the walls of the camp, yet also eerily tangible to feel the heavier mood that seemed to set in upon entering Auschwitz.
Auschwitz is an infamous place where millions of Jews and non-Jews perished. This is a place we have each learned the history of and heard stories about many times in our lives, and although the numbers are truly staggering, they can begin to become just numbers. In each area of Auschwitz we were presented with a horror related to camp life and these significant numbers and despite being directly in the camp, it was still easy to feel some distance. But, then our tour guide started to reveal some of the more personal stories related to the camp. We asked the question, “Why didn’t more people try to escape?”, a question we have all been asked by our students.
Our guide responded that prisoners knew that the S.S. and camp administrators had documentation of their family members and where they lived, which was the greatest deterrent. If a prisoner escaped, his/her family or friends would be arrested and placed in the camp, commanded to stand on a corner with a sign that said, “I am here to fill the place of________.” These new prisoners would stand by the kitchens with these signs so all of the prisoners would see them and would know what would happen if they tried to escape. We discovered that often the family members of the prisoners would die or suffer in place of their loved ones. There are only 144 recorded escapes from Auschwitz, and after hearing this story, it is clear why there weren’t more.
We heard horrific stories such as this one throughout the day, but none of that compared with seeing the videos of home movies of prisoners before the war began. We saw families playing at the beach, religious ceremonies, birthday parties, laughter, celebrations, and young and old couples sharing loving looks and gentle kisses. Life was normal. Life was exactly how ours are right now. And then it ended. Our goal is to foster empathy among our students, and today we had our own lesson in empathy. We watched videos of happy families and then walked into a building that contained over 4,000 pounds of human hair and over 88,000 shoes. The juxtaposition was truly sobering, and those numbers, although extreme, are beginning to have more significance.
Throughout the morning, we wondered how we can possibly help our students more significantly understand the gravity of these events, as well. After lunch, we attended a private workshop with an Auschwitz educator who led us through a lesson that we can re-create in our own classroom. We examined mugshots, death certificates, chronicles, and other prisoners of Auschwitz and pieced together a small image of their experiences during the Holocaust. What we did in about 10 minutes, it took historians thousands of hours to uncover and piece together. The massive numbers and statistics associated with the Holocaust can be overwhelming while adding “comfortable” distance, alienating us from empathizing with the individuals, but this workshop helps to overcome that distance and humanize the unique experience each individual had, no longer lost in the statistics. We walked away from the workshop equipped with new resources and ideas to practice next semester.
Tomorrow we will visit Auschwitz II - Birkenau for a morning tour, followed by a private workshop and lecture in the afternoon. We are looking forward to deepening our understanding of this tragedy and exploring ways to bring it back to our classrooms.
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