A collaboration between Facing History and Ourselves and the Azrieli Foundation's Holocaust Survivor Memoirs Program, first posted on Azrieli Memoirs' Blog page.
Words referencing mass atrocities of the past, such as fascist, racist, Nazi, genocide and Holocaust, carry deep historical meaning, yet these words are often misused in reference to contemporary events. Using these words too casually not only diminishes the meaning of the words themselves, but also diminishes the events that the words represent. In this blog post, we look to remember the meaning of the term genocide and the conditions that drove a lawyer named Raphael Lemkin to coin this term to describe a horrific crime — a crime that prior to 1944 lacked a name and legal repercussions.
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Topics:
Survivor Testimony,
genocide,
Genocide and Crimes Against Humanities Course,
Holocaust and Human Behaviour,
Grade 10 History,
Azrieli Foundation Memoirs
On International Holocaust Remembrance Day, and indeed everyday, it is important to remind ourselves of how important it is that we learn about the Holocaust and hear the stories of Holocaust survivors.
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Topics:
Holocaust,
Holocaust and Human Behavior,
Canada,
Holocaust Education,
genocide
During the March Break of 2016, a group of 31 students from three Toronto District School Board schools travelled to Germany, Czech Republic and Poland to learn about the history of Jewish life in Europe, and the Holocaust.
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Topics:
Europe,
Auschwitz,
genocide,
CHG
Throughout my years of teaching I began to realize something that Facing History and Ourselves so adeptly addresses- that we tend to see ourselves as “us” vs. “them.” I think that’s one of the hardest issues I’ve come across in teaching WWII, as so many students see what happened as a problem solely with Germany. “They” were racist. That could never happen “here!” It’s “their” problem. But what I really wanted to address in my classroom is that the roots of anti-Semitism and racism that led to the Holocaust were not just found in Germany!
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Topics:
Antisemitism,
Choosing to Participate,
History,
Canada,
Canadian History,
genocide,
big paper
As a middle school educator, I often find myself in the position of being unable to explore really rich resources with my class due to mature content. Several years ago I purchased 5 sets of the graphic novel MAUS, hoping to one day use it as an option for book talks.
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Topics:
Books,
Antisemitism,
Choosing to Participate,
Facing History Resources,
Holocaust,
History,
Canada,
Holocaust Education,
current events,
Middle School,
genocide,
Lesson Ideas,
Holocaust and Human Behaviour
In 2015, Dr. Rob Simon, Associate Professor at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto (OISE), and students from his teacher education course partnered with Sarah Evis, a teacher from Delta Senior Alternative School in the Toronto District School Board (TDSB), and her grade 8 students, to study Art Spiegelman’s popular intergenerational Holocaust survivor memoir and graphic novel, Maus: A Survivor’s Tale.
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Topics:
Art,
Books,
Antisemitism,
Choosing to Participate,
Holocaust,
Facing History and Ourselves,
Innovative Classrooms,
Holocaust Education,
Middle School,
Strategies,
Culturally Responsive and Relevant Pedagogy,
Night,
genocide,
Lesson Ideas,
big paper,
Inside a Genocide Classroom,
Social Justice,
Personal history
On November 26, we released Stolen Lives: The Indigenous Peoples of Canada and the Indian Residential Schools. This new resource brings educators new primary sources and first-person accounts about a painful period in Canadian history, when about 150,000 Indigenous children were forcibly taken from their families and stripped of their language, culture, and traditions.
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Topics:
Human Rights,
Facing History Resources,
Identity,
Facing History and Ourselves,
History,
Canada,
Racism,
current events,
We and They,
Culturally Responsive and Relevant Pedagogy,
genocide,
legacy,
In the news,
English Classroom,
Social Justice
“Sir, it keeps happening again and again. We don’t learn. I don’t think we’re going to get better. There doesn’t seem to be much hope.”
Three years ago a grade 12 student said this to me in my West and the World class. Every so often it echoes in my head. She was doing a research paper on Rwanda and the United Nations, and had done a significant amount of reading on the topic and she was passionately upset about how the world had allowed the Rwandan Genocide to happen.
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Topics:
Innovative Classrooms,
genocide,
Genocide and Crimes Against Humanities Course,
Lesson Ideas,
CHG,
Inside a Genocide Classroom,
Social Justice,
reflection
Here at Facing History and Ourselves, we are always reading! As the 8th Commandment of teaching Genocide says "Thou shalt read in order to understand how much more you need to read." As you readjust to being back from March Break feeling wonderfully refreshed, or are restlessly waiting for spring to arrive, and looking for something to pick up for a good read, here are some options, from us to you!
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Topics:
Books,
Professional Development,
Events,
History,
current events,
We and They,
genocide,
In the news
As a history teacher, I often struggle to help my students see the relevance of the past and understand the power it can wield in helping them to navigate the present. With this in mind, I began to plan my unit on the Armenian Genocide. This genocide occurred almost 100 years ago under the cloak of WWI in 1915, when the Ottoman government embarked upon the destruction of its Armenian population. I decided that to give voice to this genocide beyond readings and documentaries, I would invite a guest speaker from the Armenian community.
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Topics:
Choosing to Participate,
Armenian Genocide,
History,
Memorial,
genocide,
Genocide and Crimes Against Humanities Course,
Lesson Ideas,
CHG,
Personal history
