Holocaust Day January 27th
Holocaust Day (January 27th) |
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This is a subject which needs the most sensitive treatment; We should not try to frighten children but there is a shared acknowledgement that this event in our common history is something we should share and remember. The material here is not a script to be followed; it is a resource of information and reflections for you to draw upon, to make your own with the children whom you know. A small selection of websites is listed below; there are many more. Most of the websites - and this material - are more suitable for older children. The first website does have material which might be used with younger children. The BBC site has resources suitable for work with children at: news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/hi/find_out/guides/world/the_holocaust/ Other resources for adult reference are at: Genocide under the Nazis www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/genocide/ and in the Religions section: www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/judaism/ You might choose to use some illustrations from the websites, or make a PowerPoint presentation - we have left this for you to decide. The subject deserves serious reflection; if used, music to support this might have a similar theme. The theme from Schindler's List is an obvious choice. |
Here are three themes for reflection: 1. Knowing |
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Sometimes we wear a ribbon - yellow, red or pink to proclaim our commitment to a particular cause. Sometimes on birthdays we're given a badge to let those around us know how old we are. Contrast all that with having to wear a badge; a crude star sewn on your clothes to show that you were picked as a special person, a person to be picked on. A star must be painted on your home too. Then it's alright for anyone to smash your home, it's alright for anyone to pick on you - spit on you, kick you, beat you up... even kill you. A BBC survey found that almost half the adult population (45%) claim to have never even heard of Auschwitz; that figure included 60% of those aged under 35. Even among those who had heard of Auschwitz, 70% felt that they did not know a great deal about what happened there. And memories are so short that some think it's now OK to dress up and wear uniforms of people associated with creating these atrocities. |
2. Numbers |
| Not only Jews suffered - any group who didn't 'fit' was a victim of Nazi policy. Over 11 million people died in the Holocaust. (Known in Hebrew as the Shoah - a word giving the sense of 'calamity'. 'Holocaust' is a word meaning 'a burnt offering'.)
1.5 million children are thought to have been killed. Auschwitz was but one of the camps where millions were taken to their death. In Treblinka 850,000 died. In Belzec 650,000 died. In Sobibor 250,000 died. At first, many were herded into lorries where they died from the exhaust fumes fed into the sealed compartment. But this was not enough; more efficient ways of killing had to be devised and so came the gas chambers capable of death at an industrial rate - 2,000 per day at: Auschwitz - which wasn't big enough so a neighbouring camp was built. Birkenau - where more died; 900,000 never even registered as prisoners. Then on to Bergen-Belsen part of the 'final solution' and one of the most notorious concentration camps used in the holocaust. Of Jewish children alive in 1933 only 11% are believed to have been still alive in 1945. |
3. Remembering |
Martin Niemoller the German theologian who lived through the Holocaust wrote:When Hitler attacked the Jews I was not a Jew, Jesus said: Love your neighbour as much as you love yourself. Edmund Burke has this attributed to him: It is necessary only for the good man to do nothing for evil to triumph. After the liberation of the concentration camps, the world said 'never again'. Since then mass killing, 'ethnic cleansing' - call it what you will - has been the policy in (for example) Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia, Darfur and there will be other places in the future. What does remembering mean? Are we prepared to remember - and learn from history? |