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Photographs and Empathy Help Eighth Graders Connect with Pre-war Jewish Life in Europe
In order to better understand what Jewish cultural and communal life was like in Europe prior to World War II, eighth graders found photographs of European Jews taken from 1900 to 1938 and analyzed them. In addition, eighth graders researched the town and country where the photos were taken, to better understand the historical ramifications. Finally, they found their own family photograph similar to the one they selected to analyze (for example, one student selected a pre-war photograph of a family riding bicycles and compared it to a photo of his family on a bike ride), to show how life before the Holocaust was not that different from their own lives today.
“This project draws on students' empathy and allows them to really get into the shoes of those who lost their lives in the Holocaust,” says Judaic studies teacher Jennifer Baumer. “Too often we focus on the victims only as victims and not as full human beings. This project helps students see that the Holocaust destroyed not just individual lives but an entire way of being.” Added an eighth grade student, “This project shows how easily one’s life can just flip.” MORE PHOTOS
