CURRICULUM RESOURCES
We have curated a selection of teaching resources from Canada, United States and around the world. These can help deliver lessons on various topics for both antisemitism and the Holocaust to elementary and secondary students. We will continually add new content and we hope to deliver locally created resources for B.C. teachers in the near future.
THE HOLOCAUST
TEACHING THE HOLOCAUST
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This older teacher guide offers context for understanding the importance of teaching about the Holocaust.
Source: United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
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This article looks at how a historical approach to the study of the Holocaust contributes to young people’s education.
Source: The Historical Association
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This selection of lesson plans represents suggested unit outlines based on the specific amount of classroom time available. Since schedules, class period length, and the needs of individual classes and students can vary, you may need to make adjustments or accommodations that best fit your students and needs.
Source: Holocaust Center for Humanity
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A multi-discipline teacher guide for teaching the holocaust.
Source: Sydney Jewish Museum
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A curated list of resources compiled from various reputable organizations dedicated to Holocaust education. These resources aim to provide comprehensive information, survivor testimony workshops, educational materials and insights into this crucial period of history.
HOLOCAUST OVERVIEW
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This grade 6 lesson plan introduces the concept of The Holocaust and places it in historical context. It aims to develop empathy and critical thinking skills using a variety of sources.
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This lesson plan for grades 7-12 provides an introduction to the Holocaust by defining the term and highlighting the story of Holocaust survivor Gerda Weissmann.
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This combination of lesson plans for grades 7-12 work together for students to create a Holocaust timeline and then link it to the Path of the Nazi Genocide film.
Source: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
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This lesson plan, suitable for secondary school students, will introduce your students to the history of Auschwitz-Birkenau (pronounced Ow (like in how) -shvitz Beer-ken-ow), and share with them the stories of some of those who were imprisoned there.
Source: Holocaust Memorial Day Trust
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This lesson allows Grade 9 students to test their preconceptions about people in the past against real case studies. It reveals to them a far more complex understanding about how the Holocaust happened, the motivations of people in the past, and the many levels of complicity that are often neglected in accounts of the Holocaust.
Source: Centre for Holocaust Education, University of London
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This discussion guide shares the stories of survivors with resources and activities for middle and high school students that will help in increasing their awareness of the Holocaust and how it affected children.
Source: Anti Defamation League
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This lesson plan helps students learn about Jewish life in France during Nazi occupation and the consequences of the Second World War for Jews. They gain an understanding of what it meant for Jews to experience antisemitism and propaganda
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Students will be able to learn about Holocaust distortion and denial in Canada and its impact by analyzing a short film, describe what Holocaust distortion and denial is through a series of activities, understand how it has affected Canadians/individuals/communities, and reflect on the importance of Holocaust education.
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This lesson plan equips teachers and students to thoughtfully engage with Unsung Hero stories that are connected to the Holocaust. A teacher does not have to be an expert in the field of art or the Holocaust to broach this topic. Remembering the Holocaust through visual art requires a high level of sensitivity and keen awareness of the complexity of the subject matter. This lesson plan presents ten guidelines for teaching and learning that are appropriate and relevant to Holocaust education. Teachers lead students in looking at Holocaust art created by victims and survivors to deepen their historical empathy and understanding of how art conveys various meanings.
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The objective of this dedicated publication on the Holocaust and its teaching in Kosovo is to enhance Kosovo teachers’ capacity and foster their direct involvement in the development of teaching materials and textbooks. It is hoped that publishers and educational institutions will recognize this structure as one to be followed.
Source: Forum ZFD
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Students will explore the concepts of individual and collective responsibility for WWII atrocities by analyzing and critiquing Martin Niemöller’s famous statement. They will further explore and determine their own sense of responsibility for current local and world events.
Source: The National WWII Museum New Orleans
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STORIES OF THE HOLOCAUST
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This lesson plan will define the holocaust and introduce students to several child Holocaust survivors.
Source: Azrieli Foundation
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This lesson plan is centred around the true story of Hana Brady, a young Jewish girl from Czechoslovakia who lived during the Nazi era. It is a powerful and moving account that sheds light on the human stories during the Holocaust.
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This lesson plan for grades 7-12 examines Anne Frank’s diary as both a historical and a deliberately-created literary text and describes how the Holocaust affected the lives of the Frank family.
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During the completion of this project, students will learn about the experience of young children during the Holocaust through a study of the poems and pictures drawn by those imprisoned in Theresienstadt. They will create handmade butterflies to represent the children who were imprisoned. These butterflies are displayed in the classroom. This set of activities should demonstrate to children that very few children survived in Terezin.
Source: Holocaust Museum Houston
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This high school lesson plan uses Elie Wiesel’s memoir, Night, to both teach about the history and human impact of the Holocaust and helps build an understanding the fuller historical context of the events described in Wiesel’s writing
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A teacher’s guide to the exhibition Art Spiegelman, Co-Mix: A Retrospective of Comics, Graphics and Scraps detailing his work and his background in the Holocaust
Source: The Vancouver Art Gallery
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The guide has been organized into three classroom subject areas; social studies, language arts and visual art. Teachers who wish to borrow ideas across disciplines will find that the student materials are particularly easy to adapt to different teaching needs.
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This lesson plan explores responsibility for the atrocities of the Holocaust as well as the life of Raoul Wallenberg.
Source: European Commission
IMPACTS OF THE HOLOCAUST
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This lesson plan for grades 7-12 looks at the cultural and communal life of Jews in Europe to promote an understanding on the individuality of the lives lost and the community impacts of the Holocaust.
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This lesson plan develops knowledge and understanding about the diversity of Jewish life in Europe before the Holocaust and shows its impact through an exploration of ‘what was lost’.
Source: Centre for Holocaust Education, University of London
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This lesson plan aims to critically analyze the actions taken by Nazi Germany and to understand how and why the Holocaust happened by understanding the racist ideology of the regime.
Source: Holocaust Center for Humanity
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This lesson plan for grades 7-12 examines the complex factors that led German Jews to seek to emigrate from Nazi Germany and the complex factors that impeded their immigration to the United States in the 1930’s and 1940’s.
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This lesson plan explores the challenges of Jews trying to emigrate from Germany in the 1930s.
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This lesson plan for grades 7-12 focuses on the importance of considering perspective and historical context when viewing photographs as historical sources. Students will examine photographs taken in and around the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp and killing center in 1944
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A comprehensive look at many facets of the Holocaust focusing on graphic narratives.
Source: Andrea Webb
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What does it mean to be ‘liberated’? To go ‘home’? These are ideas all of us can conceive of and relate to in some way or another. In the context of the end of the Holocaust, however, these words had very different connotations for the men, women, and children who found themselves still alive at the end of the war. In this lesson students begin to explore some of these nuances. By listening to survivors’ experiences and engaging with creative writing, they are encouraged to think about what ‘liberation’ and ‘home’ actually meant to those who experienced it in 1945.
Source: Centre for Holocaust Education, University of London
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This lesson looks at how the Nazis recruited young people through the use of propaganda techniques. After obtaining a general understanding of these propaganda techniques, students will be asked to apply them to today’s marketing to teenagers.
Source: Museum of Tolerance
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How do we honor and remember those who lost their lives during the Holocaust so that part of history is never again repeated? Students will understand what the Holocaust was and when it took place, how people were part of the resistance movement and how they helped those in need by risking their lives.
MORE LESSON PLANS COMING SOON
ANTISEMITISM
ANTISEMITISM OVERVIEW
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The Antisemitism Classroom Toolkit (ACT) resource guide has been carefully designed to provide parents and educators the content and learning strategies necessary to guide young learners through a curriculum-compatible introduction to the complex and difficult topic of antisemitism.
This is a collection of lesson plans for students in Grades 1 through 8.
Source: Friends Of Simon Wiesenthal Center For Holocaust Studies
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This is a curated list of resources from Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre compiled from various reputable organizations dedicated to educating about antisemitism. These resources aim to provide comprehensive information, workshops, educational materials and insights into this rising global issue.
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Translate Hate was created to explain antisemitism. This glossary aims to improve media literacy on antisemitism and hate, especially in the digital realm. It offers a comprehensive list of terms and expressions that will help you recognize antisemitism when you see it. And once you recognize it, you can become part of the global effort to fight it—and eliminate it.
Source: American Jewish Committee
ANTISEMITISM IN HISTORY
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This extensive lesson plan looks at the evolution of antisemitism from pre-Christian through modern times and how different forms of antisemitism have been used in the past and present
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This lesson plan that is adaptable for Grades 7-12 looks at the long history of antisemitism in Germany, Europe, and the world leading up to the Holocaust – and includes a review of key definitions distinguishing fact, opinion, and belief.
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This material explores the roots of this historic prejudice, focussing on the deep history of the ‘longest hatred’ and identifies the myths and falsities that underpinned it. The lesson explores the influences that drove this antisemitism as well as its change and continuity over time. It also supports students in identifying the essential knowledge and understanding to challenge common misconceptions, and develops your students’ ability to critically engage with deep time and long-term causes.
Source: Centre for Holocaust Education, University of London
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The lessons in this unit increase students’ understanding of Jewish people and awareness that antisemitism did not end after the Holocaust, and provide them with opportunities to learn about the persistence of antisemitism in its contemporary forms.
Source: Echoes & Reflections
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This guide aims to explore common antisemitic imagery, the history of the depictions and how they manifest themselves today, specifically focussing on cases from the last decade. Antisemitism can be nuanced, and in some instances, the case studies included in this guide have caused ample debate and discussion about their meanings. However, this document serves an illustrative purpose, that for future cases the reader will be equipped to understand why such images will cause concern or should not be considered acceptable.
Source: Antisemitic Policy Trust
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This lesson plan for high school levels looks at the racism that fueled Nazi ideology and politics to provide an understanding the concept of racism in general and Nazi racial antisemitism in particular.
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This plan aims to use contemporary source material to understand antisemitism during the Nazi regime. These topics are addressed through individual case studies to show the rising levels of persecution against the Jewish population during the period.
Source: The Wiener Holocaust Library
ANTISEMITISM IN SOCIETY
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This lesson plan helps in promoting awareness, education and action regarding combatting antisemitism; however, these exercises and activities can be applied towards combatting any form of discrimination.
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This lesson plan looks at the intersection of antisemitism, sports, and society through an incident in the history of Major League Baseball.
Source: Anti-Defamation League
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This lesson plan examines ways that antisemitism manifests in sports and why this happens
Source: Anti-Defamation League
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This lesson seeks to help students make sense of current antisemitic incidents that may be happening in their community, within the United States, or in the larger global context. Students examine the definition and nature of antisemitism and how it manifests today.
Source: Echoes & Reflections Partnership
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This lesson introduces students to factual information that refutes commonly circulated antisemitic myths, which are the basis for many antisemitic remarks and incidents today.
Source: Anti-Defamation League
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This lesson plan looks at what online hate and harassment are, the recent increase and severity of it, and what can be done to address it (there are links to supporting resources).
Source: Anti-Defamation League
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This is a collection of seven defining thought pieces and exercises on anti-Zionism and Antisemitism
Source: Israel Forever Foundation
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In this lesson, students will start with themselves, considering their own experience with the concept of conflation and its impacts. Next, students will view and respond to an educational video that explores the concept of antisemitic conflation—holding all Jews accountable for the Israeli government’s actions and policies. Finally, students will closely read about recent examples of antisemitic conflation and consider how these examples contribute to their understanding of this form of antisemitism.
Source: Facing History & Ourselves
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The goal of this lesson plan is to explore how Rabbi Sacks understands the evolution of antisemitism and how we should respond.
Source: Rabbi Sacks Legacy Trust
MORE LESSON PLANS COMING SOON
JUDAISM AND THE JEWISH PEOPLE
JUDAISM OVERVIEW
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In this lesson, students will explore Judaism’s beliefs, behaviours, and experiences of belonging.
Source: Institute for Curriculum Services
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This multi-session grade 6 lesson plan covers topics including Judaism, the Torah, Jewish beliefs, and Shabbat.
Source: Quality First Education Trust
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This resource covers topics including Judaism, the Torah, Jewish beliefs, and Shabbat.
Source: History Channel
HISTORY
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Lesson plans and curricular materials — which adhere to US national learning standards — contain video segments from The Story of the Jews with Simon Schama, comprehensive instructions for classroom implementation, printable student handouts, links to online resources, and suggestions for extension activities to enhance your students’ reading, viewing, and appreciation of Jewish history.
Source: PBS
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The lesson plan implements videos in a variety of techniques for teaching and for study. It includes various levels of learning processes: video watching, using visual literacy and listening comprehension; classroom discussion; work in the full-class forum; and connecting historical information with testimony from a survivor.
Source: Yad Vashem
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In this lesson students will contemplate the tremendous challenges faced by Judaism after the destruction of the second temple and exile from Israel.
Source: JTracks
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This is lesson 2 of the unit Studying The Holocaust. In this lesson, students investigate who the Jews were before they were persecuted in the Holocaust. The centerpiece of the lesson is the profiles of six teenagers from different countries and walks of life. This glimpse into their worlds allows students to see them as individuals, creating empathy and deepening understanding of the diversity of prewar Jewish life.
Source: Echoes & Reflections Partnership
MORE LESSON PLANS COMING SOON
ISRAEL & THE MIDDLE EAST
GENERAL TOPICS
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This resource booklet discusses the debates surrounding Zionism, Israel, and the legitimacy of a Nation State for the Jewish People. The foundations on which the Jewish State was founded are constantly being questioned – both by the anti-Israel movement as well as within the Jewish world. The following attempts to cut through the confusion by leaving aside political commentary and analysis and going back to the basic concepts around which the Jewish world could always find agreement - Zionism and Israel as the Nation State of the Jewish People.
Source: Israel Forever Foundation
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This lesson examines some of the major environmental challenges in the Middle East and ways that Israelis, Jordanians, and Palestinians are cooperating to meet these challenges.
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In this lesson, students will explore the Middle East’s complex and diverse religious landscape and consider a variety of ways that religion and politics are intertwined.
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In this lesson, students will explore the concept of nationalism and connect the rise of nationalism in Europe to the emergence of both Zionism and Arab Nationalism in the late 19th century
MORE LESSON PLANS COMING SOON