C. A. Petuch
To introduce the unit, spend a class or two talking about the war in general. Teachers could start the discussion by having the students collectively compile a list of words they associate with the word
war
. From this abstract term, the next step could be to have students compile a list that will demonstrate their knowledge of World War II specifically.
After assessing the knowledge that your students have about WW II, continue the discussion by using photographs and artwork from the
Time-Life World War II
series or James Jones’
World War II
to increase their interest. What student would not become interested in World War II after seeing Benito Mussolini, with bandaged nose, after a failed assassination attempt by a 62 year old Irish woman? She said she came to shoot Mussolini or the Pope; she got to Mussolini first. Mussolini capitalized on the incident by magnanimously ordering the woman freed and deported. What student would not be sardonically amused at viewing a series of photographs of Adolf Hitler practicing gesticulations which would produce the impact he wanted to impart during his speeches?
Once the students have become enticed with photographs and artwork, introduce the first novel,
On the Other Side
of the Gate
by Yuri Suhl. This novel was inspired by an actual episode. It tells of the life of a Jewish couple in occupied Poland during World War II. Hershel and Lena Bregman are confined to a ghetto with the rest of the town’s Jews. Nazi authorities outlaw pregnancies in the ghetto so the couple’s first child, David, had to be delivered in secrecy. Only close relatives and a few trusted members of the ghetto’s underground know of little David’s existence.
When Nazi plans for deportation of the ghetto becomes known, the young couple need to find a way to smuggle David out of the ghetto. They find a sympathetic Polish family who is willing to shelter him. How this seemingly impossible plan is painstakingly realized will surely be enjoyed by students who read
On the Other Side of the Gate
.
To sustain the unit as interdisciplinary, emphasize points taken from the novel such as the following:
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a. The Jewish population probably believed, as brought out in the novel, that the world would not stand idly by and let this madman (Hitler) swallow up Poland. For its own protection, the world would stop him in his tracks. But the world only applauded the citizens of Warsaw for their brave stand behind the barricades. The world applauded, and Warsaw fell.
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b. Hershel reminds us how the Germans borrowed the idea of having the Jews wear armbands with the word JUDE sewn in the center of the Star of David. He explains that as far back as the thirteenth century, at the time of the crusades, Christian leaders decreed that Jews must wear some kind of badge on their clothing to mark them as outcasts. Three centuries later, one of the popes improved on that decree. Not only were the Jews of Rome compelled to wear yellow hats, but they were also forced to live in a ghetto.
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c. As an example of the way Jews were “transferred” to ghettos by the Germans, emphasize a typical method used in the novel. Posters were tacked up telling Jews they had 24 hours to get ready for the transfer. They were to appear at a certain location with their belongings. They could take with them whatever they could carry except furniture. In 24 hours the scene would be a stream of Jews hurrying, but making slow progress, toward the town square with their life-time possessions reduced to whatever their hands and backs could carry.
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____
____
In the case of the town in the novel, all of the town’s 2000 Jews were forced to live in the space of two and a half streets, which were enclosed with barbed wire to totally isolate the ghetto from the rest of the town and seemingly from the rest of the world. It was necessary to assign as many as six, eight, and even ten people to a single room.
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d. There is also an example of the way the Germans carried out an “action.” Four hundred Jews, mostly women, children and elderly, were dragged off to some unknown destination. To the Germans, they were known as “the nonproductive element.”
These historical facts, along with the suspense of smuggling little David to the other side of the gate, will surely be a successful beginning to the unit.
Classroom Activities:
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1. Students will write, as a journal entry, telling their thoughts and feeling on the eve of the “transfer.”
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2. Students will write a paragraph explaining why they are taking a certain personal possession with them to the ghetto.
As a contrast to the portrayal of the Germans in
On the Other Side of the Gate
, the novel
Dangerous Spring
by Margot Benary-Isbert should be read and discussed next. It is the story of the Lorenz family. The story takes place during the last days of World War II in Germany. Karin, her brother Till, and their mother, Carola, flee their hometown of Erfurt which is in danger of being invaded by Allied troops. They reluctantly leave their father, Franze, behind. He is the town’s physician and feels it is his responsibility to remain behind to care for his patients. Because of Karin’s love for Helmut Lobelius, a minister in Eberstein, she finds fleeing her hometown to go to Eberstein a bit easier to take.
The novel shows how Germans, who did not agree with Hitler’s plans for Germany and his mistreatment of Jews, felt when they had to disown their feelings of what was morally correct. They had to be silent or be silenced. They were always in the position of being very careful to whom they were speaking and about what. As a strategy to presenting this novel, I would emphasize the character of Till. He was, at the beginning, an ardent supporter of Hitler. Till, a member of the Hitler Youth Movement, is prepared to support the Third Reich until the very end. His parents and his sister do nothing to try to dissuade Till’s ambitions even though they disagree with his views. The events that change Till’s mind about what Germany stands for under Hitler’s reign should be discussed in depth. Till not only realizes the horrible and unjust ways of the Third Reich, but also realizes that it was his youthfulness that made him fall prey to the attractiveness of the Nazi party at the time. This is the best way to contrast the Germans (the Lorenz family specifically) in
Dangerous Spring
to the Germans portrayed in
On the Other Side of the Gate.
Many students will probably be surprised to know that there were some caring and humane Germans during the war; not all agreed with Hitler’s tactics for supremacy in the world.
The novel also shows the Allied troops as being very considerate of the villagers during the invasion of Eberstein. Most students picture an invasion as being a “shoot ’em up” affair. Although I am sure most were, by emphasizing this type of invasion, one which takes the feelings and wishes of the people into consideration, it will certainly leave a lasting impression.
Classroom Activities
:
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1. Students will write, in dialogue form, the conversation between Till and his sister, Karin, when he realizes how he has been misled by the propaganda. Students may expand upon the very short dialogue used in the novel.
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2. Students will describe the invasion by the Allied troops as a journalist would. These papers can be used when discussing the style of those journalists they will be reading in the nonfiction section of the unit.
The third novel of this unit will address the British experience during the London Blitz.
Fireweed
by Jill Paton Walsh was chosen principally because it is about two adolescents who brave the Blitz together.
All children had been ordered evacuated from London during the Blitz. Bill had been with a group of young people who were evacuated to Wales, and Julie’s parents had put her on a ship bound for Canada. Both, feeling homesick, managed to make their way back to London, where they meet in an Underground Station. They join forces determined to avoid re-evacuation and separation.
Despite seeing London transformed by nightly bombings, Bill and Julie have a curiously happy time. Life seems almost pleasant. For the first time in their lives, they are alone, standing on their own feet. They epitomize the courage and resilience that was so typical of the British during the worst of times.
To keep this novel in the interdisciplinary vein, stress should be placed on the following episodes from the novel:
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a. As Bill and Julie had experienced in the novel, during 1939 and 1940 a stream of reluctant “recruits” assembled on railway platforms waiting for transport. These recruits were school children who were being sent off to foster homes in rural and suburban areas. These foster homes were paid modest allowances for taking in London children. Despite the shock and hostility of first meetings of child and foster parent, the child-lift was generally a success. To further demonstrate the seriousness of the evacuation of children, photographs from the Time-Life series, The Battle of Britain volume, should be used.
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b. Road signs in Britain were removed to confuse possible invaders. British drivers turned out to be the only victims of this measure. In the novel, Bill and Julie are confused by the blacked out Underground Station signs and missing street signs.
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c. Britons were issued Anderson Bomb Shelters, as Bill’s aunt received. These shelters were prefabricated sections of steel that came with a bag of nuts and bolts and instructions for assembly. To show what they looked like, use the photographs in the Battle of Britain volume mentioned earlier.
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d. The Royal Engineers’ bomb disposal squad defused many delayed action bombs that gouged craters into London’s streets and houses. Disarming these bombs called for courage and iron-like nerves since the bomb’ s timing device could trigger an explosion at any moment. Julie and Bill come upon many barricades with signs reading “Danger Unexploded Bomb.” Bill’s aunt’s house had an unexploded bomb lodged against the kitchen windowsill, under which our two adventuresome characters creep to retrieve some of Bill’s possessions.
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e. As I have mentioned in the WW II summary section of the unit, the British civilians showed some of their finest qualities during the Blitz. There are many examples in the novel,
Fireweed
, which show their courage, their character and their resilient morale. Cite some of the more impressive actions of the British. For example, even though shops were fronted with boards instead of glass, there were “Business as Usual” signs proudly displayed. The people of London, although frightened and tired, were still friendly, talking, and sometimes singing and dancing in the Underground Stations during air-raids. An unforgettable scene from the novel, witnessed by Bill and Julie, was a woman scrubbing her doorstep and asking about the milkman. That sounds quite ordinary until one reads the description of her house. Every window in the house was blown in and the door was blasted from its hinges. They persisted absurdly in the same routineness when everything around them was changed. Students will be amused by the proud statement of a bus conductor, whose bus windows are blown out, but says that they should tell “bloody ’Itler” that the buses are still on time. Another typical scene to cite would be the streets full of bowler-hatted men carrying their black umbrellas going to work, stepping gingerly over firehoses and around craters.
Along with all of these references to what the British really experienced during the Blitz, there is a very entertaining story-line about the relationship that develops between Bill and Julie. This novel tends to sneak in the real-life experiences without the reader realizing it.
Classroom activity
:
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1. Show examples of British advertising and morale-boosting posters such as the ones in T
he Battle of Britain
volume. Students will invent their own slogans.
It seemed logical chronologically to place
Hiroshima
, by John Hersey, last in the novel section.
Hiroshima,
since it is a brilliant piece of journalism, is also a perfect way to introduce the nonfiction that will end the unit.
Not only is Hiroshima the story of six human beings who lived through the first atom bomb, but it also presents the story in a non-judgmental way. Hersey reports the events as they happened before, during and after the bomb was dropped.
The best way to approach this piece of writing is to have the students read it as a homework assignment. Each student will write down anything they would like to discuss. Many interesting discussions should develop from their notetaking. Teachers may want to emphasize particularly the way Hersey ends
Hiroshima
. What better impression can be made than by reading aloud the last paragraph. The matter-of-fact school essay written by Toshis Nakamura, who was ten at the time of the bombing, will leave a lasting impression.
To conclude the unit, I have chosen some nonfiction written by journalists covering the war. They are taken from the book
They Were There
edited by Curt Riess.
Because there are so many good pieces of writing in this book and also because I have not used a work pertaining to the American experience in WW II, I have chosen works from the “United States at War” section only. They were also chosen because they are first-hand accounts of being in a battle-zone. I have chosen “Manila” by Clark Lee, “We have done our best” by Carlos P. Romulo, “City in Prison” by Joseph Alsop, Jr., and “Augery of Death” by Raymond Clapper. Teachers of history may want to choose one essay from each section of the book to project a well-rounded view.
In addition to reading and discussing these works, the role and responsibilities of a journalist could be discussed. Students could try their hands at writing nonfiction. A good exercise in journalistic writing could be to have the students write an account as an American journalist would as opposed to the way a foreign correspondent would report the same incident.