Another Look at Diversity

Diversity

This year, in my social psychology unit, I used a lesson from Echoes and Reflections, a Holocaust education resource program, to open up a dialogue about racism, discrimination, intolerance, sexism, hate crimes and other issues related to diversity. We viewed clips of Holocaust survivors and then watched a dated PBS documentary, circa 1996, called “Not in Our Town,” about a group of citizens in Billings, Montana, who joined together and stood up to put an end to anti-Semitism.

The documentary led to a social movement, and there is a wonderful webpage (https://www.niot.org/) and YouTube channel which highlights modern “Not in Our Town” messages across America. I highly recommend both as resources in the classroom. Ironically, this lesson coincided with an incident less than a mile from our school, where an anti-Sematic message was spray-painted across the front of a business in plain view of all of our students passing by. This happened in an affluent, middle class neighborhood, proof that it can happen anywhere.

I wrapped up this message by asking students to work informally in groups and choose a minority population for which to advocate, with the intent of expressing this group’s view points and any discrimination faced by them to the other students. The goal was to teach empathy and compassion. This part of the plan was literally put together on a whim as our conversations unfolded; however, I was stunned by how wonderful the presentations were. Here is an example of one of the beautiful messages that was delivered. It is shared with permission.

 

This month, our school participated in the First Annual Holocaust Education Resource Council (HERC) Living History Museum. I am on both the HERC education committee and the school’s committee, so I wanted to contribute something special. I asked my students to create a mural that would reflect that they had learned as part of our “Not in Our Town” unit.

This is the final product. We named it Diversity.

Lessons from the Holocaust Learned by a Young Child

My son, M, who is now eight and in the 2nd grade, attended a Holocaust Education Resource Council (HERC) education committee meeting with me at Tallahassee’s Temple Israel in October. I had no sitter and, the quiet little man that he is, I knew that I could depend upon him to behave. At that meeting, we discussed how the book And Every Single One Was Someone by Phil Chernofsky can and should be used in high school curriculum. This profound publication literally lists the word “Jew” 6 million times. Something about the number intrigued him and, even though I did not think he was paying attention to our conversation due to his tablet in one hand and a piece of cake in the other, he actually very much was.

Since that meeting, M has regularly asked when he can go back with me to visit the Temple. He has asked me simple questions about Jewish culture and how it differs from ours and our Baptist faith.

Then, a couple of weeks ago, he surprised me. M told me that he had read a book about Anne Frank in school. He is extremely bright and reads on a very high level, but he is also sensitive and internalizes emotions. I worried a little that he was exposed to content too mature for his age.

I questioned him about what he had read, and he told me basic facts about Anne Frank’s story, including her death.  He was matter-of-fact about it, but then he said, “Mama, at the end of the book, I really wanted to cry. I had to hold back my tears so my friends didn’t see me.”

This touched me so much, and I told him that he should have wanted to cry, and that it was horrible what had happened during the Holocaust. I explained that everyone should want to cry about Anne Frank’s story and others’ and that it is bad when we do not.

Several mornings later, while driving to school, M spoke up out of nowhere again. He said, “Mom, was Anne Frank one of the names in that book? The book that had ‘Jew’ written 6 million times? Was her family in that book, too?”

I told him yes, and I praised him for understanding that truth. I realized once again that he is like a little sponge and absorbs so much more than I give him credit for. I also thought how profound it is that an eight-year-old can make such important connections, when adults often cannot.

NOTE: M’s teacher confirmed that the book that he read in school was Who Was Anne Frank? by Ann Abramson. This book is part of a popular series that he loves and is age appropriate.