Kids Being Interviewed About the Holocaust

[damnedifIknow]

http://www.gedenkmovement.org/

[cali]

1. gad that's depressing. not even a little surprising though.

It may bring charges of elitism, but we are a nation with a long and proud history of ignorance.

[PatrickforO]

2. This is what happens when we allow the crazy right to take over our school boards, and when we care

more about test scores than real knowledge.

The most troubling statement here was, "It isn't gonna happen again, so I'm not gonna worry about it."

Sadly, this is not true.

We're in real trouble here.

[cali]

3. I think the worst was the several kids who said I'm Jewish. they clearly knew about it but

because it happened to a group they're not part of, they didn't care.

[smirkymonkey]

15. And the amazing thing is that they were minorities themselves.

I weep for the future.

[Behind the Aegis]

23. You left out a word!

But, you are correct, that is the worst thing IMO is because it happened to Jews it isn't worth knowing about or understanding. That attitude is very familiar! Very familiar. Their lack of knowledge explains quite a bit. I see some of the same lack of knowledge and blatant ignorance in places where one wouldn't think it would exist.

[muriel_volestrangler]

29. I didn't learn about it from school; I learnt about it from the common culture

I was at school in the 70s and 80s, in the UK, and WW2 was right at the end of what was taught to us in History, and we spent very little time on it, and the Holocaust was, I think, mentioned, but wasn't a big subject. But I knew about it because it is talked about, both directly, and referenced in other ways (such as calling something else a holocaust; it's not as if the pre-genocidal definition is talked about much, so when the word is used, you find out about the genocide).

Blaming school boards is simplistic; it's up to people to talk about it, have an idea of what the past has been like, and to expect others, including children growing up, to know something about them too.

[Bad Thoughts]

4. How dangerous not to recognize the present dangers of genocide

Even before we look at the error of seeing the Holocaust as a solely Jewish event without universal implications, genocide itself has had victims and perpetrators of many origins. Africans have been both victims and perpetrators in Namibia and Rwanda. The Japanese have been accused of practicing it in China. And it is recent, happening within the last two decades.

[nomorenomore08]

19. Plus the Balkans, Darfur, arguably in the east Congo as well (mass murder/rape of whole villages).

Not to mention Dubya's little "adventure" in Iraq which, if not a deliberate genocide in the strict sense, has produced such a high body count that the distinction doesn't matter very much.

[BillZBubb]

5. When I see things like this I just wonder

did they just cherry pick the worst responses or were they all like those shown?

Even so, by the age of 18 everyone in the US should know what happened during the Holocaust.

The teaching of history in the US has become pretty much a joke. A bad joke.

[LanternWaste]

6. I'd say it's less the teaching, and more the collective will to learn.

I'd say it's less the teaching and curriculum, and more the collective will to learn.

[BillZBubb]

7. It's complex. History has definitely been de-emphasized and politicized.

Kids don't like to learn it and not much is expected. So, we're at where we're at.

[winter is coming]

10. I've got a kid going into high school who's known about the Holocaust for years,

but not from anything that was taught at school. They haven't gotten beyond the Civil War in History class.

[AngryAmish]

17. Who won?

[LWolf]

24. Look at your state standards and scope and sequence.

In both states I've taught in, the sequence of history ended in 8th grade with reconstruction. Nobody got 20th century until high school.

We teach what the state dictates. One of the other negative consequences of high-stakes testing is that we have to account for our time, and get in trouble if we add in anything not on that scope and sequence, or if we focus too much time and attention on anything that's not tested...and history isn't.

Those of us that DO talk about the Holocaust in middle school generally do so in English class, as part of a literature unit.

It's a back-door end run around all of those restrictions above, and even with this, we have to document the literacy standards we're addressing, and, in many places, find sources within our adopted texts.

In my 8th grade classroom, we use some novels, biographies, and short stories and articles involving the Holocaust, front-loading historical background to give them context before we dive in. None of this is in the district adopted materials; I sneak it in during term transitions, which means we can never go as in-depth as I'd like.

[winter is coming]

27. Sadly, that doesn't surprise me at all. It wasn't "taught" when I was a kid, either,

but I was a voracious reader.

[damnedifIknow]

8. But it's all over places like Netflix

I just don't understand how these kids don't know what it is even if not taught in school.

[BillZBubb]

9. Maybe parents think they are protecting their kids by

sheltering them from exposure to such a gruesome event. I know I didn't really get the full impact until I was over 18 and I saw a BBC show "The World at War". It had an episode on the death camps. Before that I knew about it, I knew the numbers of victims, but that was clinical. The show was shocking and heartbreaking. Seeing the archival footage brought the reality home.

[Bad Thoughts]

12. I've seen this several times

The most notable was an African American woman, who had an impeccable education, who did not teach her sons about slavery. Being both Jewish and Hispanic, I've made sure that my son knows something about all forms of intolerance. I also make sure he knows about warfare, its uses and its follies.

[valerief]

26. If it's not in some stupid superhero movie, they don't know about it. nt

[muriel_volestrangler]

30. Ironically, Captain America is a WW2 superhero created to fight the Nazis

and then frozen for decades (the comic started in WW2, and was then brought back - in the sixties). Anyone paying attention to Captain America ought to know something about WW2, and hopefully the Holocaust.

[LWolf]

11. There are multiple factors.

The first? High-stakes testing.

I have been scolded, lectured, and had my evaluation threatened if I didn't "quit teaching so much history and concentrate on reading test prep."

Not only are teachers' evaluations tied, in part, to standardized tests, so are principals'.

Then there is the "Why should we learn about all those people who are dead and gone? Let's focus on NOW" anti-intellectual whining. If the community feels this way, so does the school board.

Our society doesn't value history as much as it should.

It's also structural.

Generally, the sequence of teaching history doesn't get to the 20th Century until high school. My local high school requires (2) history classes, one term each. That's 2/3 of one year out of the four high school years spent on history. One of those classes is U.S. history, the other is global history. That's a hell of a lot of history to cover in a short time. The holocaust should be in there, of course, but we're talking about a quick survey of the 20th century, not an in-depth study.

With the constant high-stakes testing demands, teachers are struggling to get everything that is an actual requirement done. Anything outside of what is actually required is really hard to get to. There are resources out there. We need more time, and actual permission to spend that time.

http://www.ushmm.org/educators

[BillZBubb]

20. I hear you. You've got a tough job.

The whole testing thing makes no sense. How we got into that trap I'll never understand.

[smirkymonkey]

16. I would like to know where these interviews were taking place.

What part of the country I mean.

[Basic LA]

13. These "kids" are nearly grown.

I was expecting innocent little kids giving their take, which might've been endearing. But this bunch, whew, heaven help us.

[Codeine]

14. This is why we surround our kids with history.

In terms of the Holocaust specifically my 11-year-old has already seen The Boy in the Striped Pajamas as well as Schindler's List. Our shelves and tables are full of history books and magazines (and lots of Batman comics -- sue me!) and we make sure she "gets" the importance of knowing what went on.

[csziggy]

18. "It doesn't really matter to me since I'm Japanese"

THAT one pissed me off. She needs to learn the history of own people. They had their own version of the Holocaust in SE Asia. But that is mentioned even less often than the Holocaust in Europe.

[BillZBubb]

21. I have seen similar things about Japanese student's WWII knowledge.

Their government totally covers up what really went on.

[csziggy]

22. I shouldn't be too surprised

I grew up in the South with an American History teacher who called the Civil War "The War of Northern Agression" and tried to teach us that it was all the "Yankee's" fault that the South was forced into fighting. "Uncle Tom's Cabin" ws held up as an example of outrageously deceiptful propaganda - we spent six weeks studying it and listening to her rant at how incorrect the portrayal of slavery was. In the early dys of desegregtion with some of the first black students she had ever had to teach it was grotesque. Even as a kid I was amazed at her perverted version of history!

But I read a lot and on a wide range of subjects from a variety of sources. Many of the kids in the class had no clue - and they are probably aging Tea Partiers now, part of the very red portion of Central Florida.

[Facility Inspector]

25. These are the people who will make decisions about your life

Tell me there isn't a vested interest to keep people stupid.

[DirkGently]

28. Holy god. "There hasn't been racism since the 1800s?"

"It doesn't affect me because I'm not Jewish."

Please tell me this was all at a school for children with head injuries.

Can't accomplish anything going forward if we have no idea where we've been.

Ugh.