EDUCATION & RESOURCES
Young Adult Holocaust Books
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Click below to explore categories and find lesson plans and training materials that match your curricular needs. For foundational tools that support any unit on the Holocaust, refer to Fundamentals of Teaching the Holocaust.
Facing History and Ourselves
Facing History fosters empathy and reflection, improves students’ academic performance, reinvigorates teachers, and builds safe and inclusive schools. By integrating the study of history, literature, and human behavior with ethical decision making and innovative teaching strategies, our program enables secondary school teachers to promote students’ historical understanding, critical thinking, and social-emotional learning. As students explore the complexities of history, and make connections to current events, they reflect on the choices they confront today and consider how they can make a difference.
Echoes & Reflections
Echoes & Reflections provides in-person and online professional development to equip educators with research-based strategies for teaching as well as a comprehensive array of print and digital content to use in the classroom.
Lesson Plans and Teacher Toolbox
Created by award winning Holocaust and Genocide educator Drew Beiter, use these in-depth, easy to use lessons on The Holocaust, Nuremberg Trials, and Human Rights.
Have your students walk in the footsteps of Elie Wiesel by using this lesson from the Robert F. Kennedy Center created by Drew Beiter.
The Holocaust Education Video Tool Box uses short film to give teachers tools they can use in the classroom. The focus is on methodological and pedagogical suggestions, as well as practical materials and discussion points for classrooms and groups.
Blue Tattoo Educational Unit
We invite teachers to download the Blue Tattoo Film PowerPoint classroom unit for grades 7-12. It is intended to supplement your existing Holocaust related curriculum. The presentation includes background information, discussion topics/assignments and an edited version of the film, “Blue Tattoo: Dina’s Story, Joe’s Song.”
Holocaust Books for Young Students
For more information please contact Robin Kurss, Phone: 716-463-5064. Email: robin@buffalojewishfederation.org.
2023 Yom HaShoah Commemoration
featured 6 local Holocaust survivor families. Children and grandchildren descendants, the last living link to survivors, spoke on behalf of their survivor family members. It is through them that future generations will hear the stories of their survival, see the human face of the Holocaust, as well as understand its details, its place in history and how the Holocaust is experienced and understood today.
“We Remember”
— From our 2016 Yom HaShoah Ceremony, “We Remember” is a documentary on Six Local Holocaust Survivors. The film was created by Jim Gang and Rich Kellman. The YHS committee felt strongly that as long as we have Survivors living in our community we should hear their voices. Jim and Rich have been videotaping and creating classroom-friendly documentaries.
2015 Kristallnacht Ceremony
— This video is from our 2015 Kristallnacht Ceremony, made by Pieter Weinrieb. Kristallnacht, literally, “Night of Crystal,” is often referred to as the “Night of Broken Glass.” The name refers to the wave of violent anti-Jewish attacks which took place on November 9 and 10, 1938. This wave of violence took place throughout Germany, annexed Austria, and in areas of the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia recently occupied by German troops
Local Resources
Anne Frank Project
Improving the world one story at a time.
The Anne Frank Project uses storytelling as a vehicle for community building, conflict resolution, and identity exploration. Inspired by the wisdom of Anne Frank, AFP surfaces and shares stories stifled by oppression.
The Academy for Human Rights
Ensuring a more just, equitable, and sustainable world.
Founded in 2008 by several teachers in Buffalo, the Academy for Human Rights (formerly known as The Summer Institute for Human Rights) was originally created to host a summer program for high school students. This Summer Symposium continues today, running for five days each July. In 2015, the Academy for Human Rights began offering professional development opportunities for teachers throughout the year as well.