Lesson Preperation

Subject : History

Grade: VII

Unit: World War II

Lesson: <Holocaust>

Purpose of the lesson

• Informing pupils about suffering of the innocent victims of the nazi policy, and many children among them.
• Teaching pupils: to recognize negativity of nazi regime, to find sympathy for the victims' suffers, to recognize the human values without racial, religious or sexual prejudices, and learn to develop the society of equal people.
• Introducing the pupils in the new terms: anti-Semitism, antifascism, genocide and holocoust and their meaning in the world history.

Introduction

Tears

And thereafter come...
tears,
without them
there is no life.
Tears…
inspired  by grief
tears
that fall like rain.

Alena Synkova

The Old House

The old house stands here forsaken,
In silence, in slumber,
How beautiful this house was once,
How beautiful then, standing here.

It is forsaken,
Mouldering in silence,
Alas for the house!
Alas for the times!

Franta Bass

To Olga

Listen!
The boat whistle has soundesd now
And we must sail
Out toward the unknown port.

We'll sail a long, long way
And dreams will turn to truth.
Oh, how sweet the name Morocco!
Listen!
Now is the time.

The wind sings songs of far away,
Just look up to heaven
And think about the violets.

Listen!
Now is the time.

On a Sunny Evening

On a purple sun-shot eveninmg
Under wide-flowering chestnut trees
Upon the threshold full of dust
Yesterday, today, the days are all like these.

Trees flower forth in beauty,
Lovely, too, their very wood all gnarled and old
That I am half afraid to peer
Into their crowns of gold.

The sun has made a veil of gold So lovely that my body aches.
Above, the heavens shriek with blue
Convinced I've smiled by some mistake.
The world's abloom and seems to smile.
I want to fly but where, how high?
If in a barbed wire, thing can bloom
Why couldn't I? I will not die!

Home

I gaze and gaze into the world,
Into the wide and distant world,
I gaze and gaze towards the south- east,
I gaze and gaze towards my home.

I gaze towards home,
Towards the town where I was born,
My town, my native town,
How gladly I would return to you.

Pupils should read the poems in quiet, and after a few seconds, when they set the impressions, the teacher asks introducing questions.

• How do you like those poems?
• Have those poems anything income?
• What do you think, what is the age group of the poets? 

Developing the Lesson

Teacher should explain the pupils that the authors of those poems are the children from the concentration camp Terezin (Teressianstadt), age 10- 16. After that teacher should locate the camp Terezin (Teressianstadt) on the European geographic map. It is very important to explain some terms to pupils, which we numbered in purpose of the lesson:

Before we start talking about the events that caused The World War II, we must find out some unknown terms.

Anti-Semitism is artificially made hate against Jews, justified by accusing them for troubles caused by the economic crisis. Anti-Semitism was common in Europe even before XX. Century, but in the 30's, shows its worse form.

Genocide is a crime against whole one nation, extermination of the nation.

Holocaust is the name for burnt sacrifice, and it came from the Greek, and Jewish ritual sacrifices. The name is Greek, but it becomes in the others languages a name for a total sacrifice. In the year between the year 1933 and 1945. It was the name for extermination of Jews. Jewish version of this name is Shoah.

It is especially important to explain historical context of holocaust and genocide in the World War II, to explain the development of the events from founding the ghettos till opening concentrationcamps, and to explain the differences. It might look like this:

The world biggest economic crisis started in 1929. For the German economic situation, this crisis was even harder, because, as a main war culprit, Germany had to pay big war reparations.

At the 1933, in Germany, the leader of National- socialistic Party (Nazi- Party), Adolf Hitler, took over the government. While he was coming at the governmental position, Hitler developed political program in which for all evil that happened to German ("clean","Arian") people, accused Jews, Gypsies and the other  "non- Arial groups", as well as people which he considered physically or by personality unfit for the "New world order". At the year 1935, the German government found the " Nurnberg laws" at which Jewish civil rights are taken over so in Germany anti-Semitism raised, and the open attacks against Jews and their properties started all over Germany. When the World War II started, and Hitler's occupied some of the European countries, the pogrom of Jews started also there. At first, Jews were transferred to the "ghettos" – special parts of towns, where they could be more controlled, and all by the same cause: "solving the Jewish question in the Europe". Many people died in ghetto, some because of the infective illnesses, some because of hunger, and some by violent death.

Teacher can use the fragment from the Emanuel Ringelblum's diary "Notes from the Warszawa ghetto:

"I heard that the Wengrow rabbi was killed at the Yom Kippur (big Jewish holyday when everybody fasts and prays). He was ordered to clean the street, and to pick up the excrement and put it into his hat. While he was banding, nazi soldier with a bayonet stabbed him three times. He didn't stop working, he died while he was working."

In the continuation, teacher can use fragment from the ghetto-child's diary:

"This isn't a home any more. It's hospital. Everyone avoids us. Half the children are sick in bed. The number of the sick goes up every day. Rooms full of patients, and the doctor do not know what to do. There is a great deal of tension among the older children. They are going to send transports to the ghetto-into the unknown. Fifteen hundred children will arrive tonight. They are from Poland. We are making little toys for them. They look awful. You can't guess how old they are. They all have old faces and tiny bodies. They are all bare- legged and only a very few have shoes. They returned from the reception center with their heads shaved. They have lice. They all have such frightened eyes. We got used to standing in line at seven o' clock in the morning, at twelve noon, and again at seven o' clock in the evening. We stood in a long line with a plate in our hand, and they gave us a little warmed-up water with a salty or coffee flavor. Or else they gave us a few potatoes. We got used to sleeping without a bed, to saluting every uniform, not to walk on the sidewalks and then again to walk on the sidewalks. We got used to undeserved slaps, blows, and executions. We got used to seeing people die, to seeing piled- up coffins full of corpses, to seeing the helpless doctors. We got used to it that from time to time, one thousand unhappy souls would come here and that, from time to time, another unhappy souls would go away…"

After that the teacher continues with explaining the historical context:

During the German expansion, the concentration camps were founded in Europe, with some differences between them. Some of them were like wider ghettos, but some of them were found for the mass exterminations in most cruel ways. In those camps many of the children and the handicaps were used for medical experiences, and researches. The concentration camps gave to World War II characteristic of most brutal war, especially against the civil population.

The teacher can use some photos of ghetto, "umschlagplatz" (place, near ghetto, where the nazis divided men from women and children for further transportation to concentration camps) or concentration camps. It is also possible to use testimony from the book: "I Never Saw Another Butterfly"

"It is weeks since I came to this ghetto. I did not know that such a thing could happen to me. When I go home, I'm going to eat only white bread… When I go home, I'm going to make my bed every day, clean… When I go home, I'm going to have pretty white curtains- rugs, too. I'm going to play ball in the courtyard when I go home and shout if I want to… I'm going to sit very quiet and read story books as long as I want to when I go home- all night maybe. I'm going to play the piano when I go home and everyone will sing and won't care how noisy we are… When I go home… I've lived here in the ghetto more than a year. In Terezin, in the black town now, and when I remember my old home so dear, I can love it more than I did, somehow. Ah, home, home, why did they ever tear me away? Here the weak die easy as a feather. And when they die, they die forever. I'd like to go back home again. It makes me think of sweet spring flowers. Before, when I used to live at home, it never seemed so dear and fair. Today I went to see my uncle in the other barracks. There I saw them throw potato peelings, and people threw themselves on the little piles and fought for them. Tomorrow the SS men are coming and no children can go out in the street. We aren't allowed to go out of the barracks. We can't go out in the streets without a pass, and children don't get a pass… Last night I had a beautiful dream: I was home. I saw our flat and our street. Now I am disappointed and out of sorts, because I awoke in the bunk instead of my own bed. "

After that the pupils should read the poems again, now, informed about historical situation in which they were made. The teacher can ask these questions:

• Those children were of the same age as you are now, what do you think they missed most?
• How did the Terezin camp children describe their world and changes around them?

The teacher asks next question:

• What do you know about the situation in Croatia at that time?

Depending on the answer, teacher can continue explanation. That can look like this:

For better understanding Croatian situation during the World War II, we have to return in the period between two world wars. Croatia went a part of Kingdom of Yugoslavia, where are, gradually, all Croatian's national Rights, have been taken away from the great- Serbian hegemony policy. Culmination went when the assassination on the Croatian representatives took place in the State Parliament in Belgrade, at 1928. As he could not settle down state situation, the king declared a dictatorship and revoked the State Parliament. Croatian people resisted the king's dictatorship in the two ways. Croatians in Croatia were gathering over the Croatian Peasant Party, and emigrated Croats were active in the Croatian Party of Rights and its movement  "Ustasha- Croatian liberation movement."

When the Germans and Italians attacked  "disobedient" Kingdom of Yugoslavia, in the April of 1941, they decided to make "marionette-countries" on that territory. They needed a state in unoccupied parts of Croatia, totally subordinated to Germany and Italy, and their policy. Since Dr. Vladko Ma¥ek, the leader of the Croatian Peasant Party, refused cooperation with them (and he was Germans favorite), Italian solution passed over, so as a leader of the Independent State of Croatia was inaugurated Dr. Ante Paveli¥, leader of the Croatian Party of Rights and the constitutor of the "Ustasha"-movement. First enthusiasm of final independence went down very soon, when the most of the Croatian Adriatic coast was given to Italy and when new regime became copy of German and Italian regimes. In Independent State of Croatia, as in the Vichy France, Lithuania and the others allies of Third Pact, government started to carry out several laws, which considered opening of concentration camps (Lobor, Jasenovac…), and also deportation started (to Auschwitz etc., out of Croatia), made by Germans and Ustashas. Lobor was similar to Terezin, mostly deportation camp for women and children. At the May of 1995, Croatian State Archive signed agreement with a Washington Holocaust Museum and gave the documentation about 6573 Jews killed during the World War II, in Croatia.

The teacher can ask this question:

• How would you explain this sentence: "Who saved just one life, saved the whole world."?

After the answer, and depending on it, teacher can explain the sentence.

"Who saved just one life, saved the whole world." Is a Jew sentence, which describe best "Righteous among the Nations"" Every year the State of Israel awards certain number of people, which couldn't look the sufferings of innocent Jews, during the World War II, so they putting their lives and their families in the danger, helped Jewish people. In Croatia, according the Jewish Community documentation, there were seventy Righteous.

Specific situation was with head of Catholic Church in Croatia, archbishop Stepinac. As a man of a faith, totally dedicated to the God, archbishop Stepinac (later declared as a cardinal) resisted with all his strength to all laws which were made against humans and which discriminated people in any ways. Very often, he came into conflict with "ustasha" government, for saving Jews and Serbs. In that effort he came in danger very often.

The teacher can use the parts of a book "Cardinal Alojzije Stepinac", originally: "LE CARDINAL STEPINAC, martyr des droits de l'homme". Also, the photos from the book can be used. Teacher can continue:

Already at 1941, while he was an archbishop, Stepinac criticized new government and applied people to peace. At the January 9,1942, he sent a letter to a cardinal Maglione in Italy:

"Request for intervention at benefit of two hundred Jewish orphans

In Zagreb, there are about two hundred Jewish children, mostly without parents, in the age of 7 to 17, because of anti-Semite laws spending their lives in misery. The Jewish Community in Zagreb would like, with approve of Italian government, send that boys to a Florence, or any other place in Italy, where they could go to school or start some physical work, at costs of local Jewish Community.

Signer of this letter informed Italian Minister in Zagreb about this matter, and he said that this is a charitable and not political matter. Same Minister thinks, that the intervention of Holly Father.

Because of that I beg your Holiness, to intervene with Italian government so they could give requested permission, and that soon as it is possible, because waiting is dangerous." (Pg.95)

At sermon ahead the cathedral in Zagreb in October, 31,1943:

" We always emphasized, in the public life, the principals of God's lows, whether it is matter of Croats, Serbs, Jews, Gypsies, Catholics, Muslims, orthodox or anyone else." (Pg.91)

There were only a few people in enslaved Europe who talked that way. The destiny of cardinal Stepinac was that he was, after communists arrived, accused and convicted as a fascist- collaborator and the enemy of regime. He was tortured in prison. As martyr and a fighter for the Human Rights against all unfair regimes, he died in 1960, when all his civic rights were taken away, and his priestly work was forbidden. Pope John Paul II, declared cardinal Stepinac as a blessed, at October 2, 1998.

The teacher can ask this question:

• What is antifascism?

After pupil's answering, the teacher can explain:

Antifascism is a political attitude against fascism, so that term includes liberalism and democracy. It appears in history at thirties years of the XX century, as a reaction on Nazism and fascism.

Because the regime in Independent State of Croatia disappointed big part of Croatian people, it is not surprise that, among only a few in Europe, in Croatia was founded First Partisan Detachment, at June, 22, 1941, and with it's actions marked start of antifascism in Croatia. It is a big contribution of Croatian people to world antifascist battle.

Concluding the Lesson

First group of questions:

• How do you like those poems?
• Have those poems anything income?
• What do you think, what is the age group of the poets? 

• I found those poems very interesting and…unusual, I never red poems like those. (Luka, 14)
• All of those poems are little bit sad, nostalgic. (Maja, 13 and a half) To me, all that poems are very serious. (Jan, 14)
• I think that authors of those poems are high school pupils. (Marko, 13 and a half) No they aren't, I think that authors are grown up people. (Neala, 14) I think that you are both wrong, and that the authors of those poems are children of our age. (Mania, Marko's sister, 14 and a half)

Second group of questions:

• Those children were same age as you are now, what do you think they missed most?
• How did the Terezin camp children describe their world and changes around them?

• I think that they missed homes, most of all. (Marko) They missed everything they had: games freedom, piano…(Aleksandra 14)
  
• There were big differences between their homes and concentration camp they came, and that hearted them. They realized that they miss ordinary, normal things: white bread, clean curtains…(Jan) Even in the concentration camp, nobody could stop blooming in nature and their blooming to. (Aleksandra)

The question from the third part:

• What do you know about the situation in Croatia in that time?

• I know that in Croatia were different armies: partisans, "ustashas",  "domobrans", that Italians Germans and Hungarians arrived. There were also chetnics". I know, also that  "ustashas" founded Independent State of Croatia, but it was not good because it was similar to Germany, and concentration camps were opened. (Goran 13 and a half)

The question from the fourth part:

• How would you explain this sentence: "Who saved just one life, saved the whole world."?

• This who saved only one life made a lot of good for the whole world… Every life is important (Maja)

The question from the fifth part:

• What is antifascism?

• Antifascism is fight against fascism. (Goran)

Materials for Pupils

Poems

Tears

And thereafter come...
tears,
without them
there is no life.
Tears…
inspired  by grief
tears
that fall like rain.

Alena Synkova

The Old House

The old house stands here forsaken,
In silence, in slumber,
How beautiful this house was once,
How beautiful then, standing here.

It is forsaken,
Mouldering in silence,
Alas for the house!
Alas for the times!

Franta Bass

To Olga

Listen!
The boat whistle has soundesd now
And we must sail
Out toward the unknown port.

We'll sail a long, long way
And dreams will turn to truth.
Oh, how sweet the name Morocco!
Listen!
Now is the time.

The wind sings songs of far away,
Just look up to heaven
And think about the violets.

Listen!
Now is the time.

On a Sunny Evening

On a purple sun-shot eveninmg
Under wide-flowering chestnut trees
Upon the threshold full of dust
Yesterday, today, the days are all like these.

Trees flower forth in beauty,
Lovely, too, their very wood all gnarled and old
That I am half afraid to peer
Into their crowns of gold.

The sun has made a veil of gold So lovely that my body aches.
Above, the heavens shriek with blue
Convinced I've smiled by some mistake.
The world's abloom and seems to smile.
I want to fly but where, how high?
If in a barbed wire, thing can bloom
Why couldn't I? I will not die!

Home

I gaze and gaze into the world,
Into the wide and distant world,
I gaze and gaze towards the south- east,
I gaze and gaze towards my home.

I gaze towards home,
Towards the town where I was born,
My town, my native town,
How gladly I would return to you.

The fragment of the ghetto-child's diary

"This isn't a home any more. It's hospital. Everyone avoids us. Half the children are sick in bed. The number of the sick goes up every day. Rooms full of patients, and the doctor do not know what to do. There is a great deal of tension among the older children. They are going to send transports to the ghetto-into the unknown. Fifteen hundred children will arrive tonight. They are from Poland. We are making little toys for them. They look awful. You can't guess how old they are. They all have old faces and tiny bodies. They are all bare- legged and only a very few have shoes. They returned from the reception center with their heads shaved. They have lice. They all have such frightened eyes. We got used to standing in line at seven o' clock in the morning, at twelve noon, and again at seven o' clock in the evening. We stood in a long line with a plate in our hand, and they gave us a little warmed-up water with a salty or coffee flavor. Or else they gave us a few potatoes. We got used to sleeping without a bed, to saluting every uniform, not to walk on the sidewalks and then again to walk on the sidewalks. We got used to undeserved slaps, blows, and executions. We got used to seeing people die, to seeing piled- up coffins full of corpses, to seeing the helpless doctors. We got used to it that from time to time, one thousand unhappy souls would come here and that, from time to time, another unhappy souls would go away…"

The fragment of the book "I Never Saw Another Butterfly"

"It is weeks since I came to this ghetto. I did not know that such a thing could happen to me. When I go home, I'm going to eat only white bread… When I go home, I'm going to make my bed every day, clean… When I go home, I'm going to have pretty white curtains- rugs, too. I'm going to play ball in the courtyard when I go home and shout if I want to… I'm going to sit very quiet and read story books as long as I want to when I go home- all night maybe. I'm going to play the piano when I go home and everyone will sing and won't care how noisy we are… When I go home… I've lived here in the ghetto more than a year. In Terezin, in the black town now, and when I remember my old home so dear, I can love it more than I did, somehow. Ah, home, home, why did they ever tear me away? Here the weak die easy as a feather. And when they die, they die forever. I'd like to go back home again. It makes me think of sweet spring flowers. Before, when I used to live at home, it never seemed so dear and fair. Today I went to see my uncle in the other barracks. There I saw them throw potato peelings, and people threw themselves on the little piles and fought for them. Tomorrow the SS men are coming and no children can go out in the street. We aren't allowed to go out of the barracks. We can't go out in the streets without a pass, and children don't get a pass… Last night I had a beautiful dream: I was home. I saw our flat and our street. Now I am disappointed and out of sorts, because I awoke in the bunk instead of my own bed. " 

The fragments of the book "Cardinal Alojzije Stepinac"

"Request for intervention at benefit of two hundred Jewish orphans
In Zagreb, there are about two hundred Jewish children, mostly without parents, in the age of 7 to 17, because of anti-Semite laws spending their lives in misery. The Jewish Community in Zagreb would like, with approve of Italian government, send that boys to a Florence, or any other place in Italy, where they could go to school or start some physical work, at costs of local Jewish Community.

Signer of this letter informed Italian Minister in Zagreb about this matter, and he said that this is a charitable and not political matter. Same Minister thinks, that the intervention of Holly Father.
Because of that I beg your Holiness, to intervene with Italian government so they could give requested permission, and that soon as it is possible, because waiting is dangerous." (Pg.95)

" We always emphasized, in the public life, the principals of God's lows, whether it is matter of Croats, Serbs, Jews, Gypsies, Catholics, Muslims, orthodox or anyone else." (Pg.91)