GOA Partners with Jewish Federation of Greater MetroWest for 10th Grade Holocaust Curriculum

As a Jewish day school, Golda Och Academy consistently evaluates our curriculum, ensuring we give our students the strongest possible foundation in Jewish history to prepare them for the outside world. To better meet that goal, we have designed a new Holocaust curriculum for the 10th grade, incorporating Holocaust learning for the entire grade through a partnership with Jewish Federation of Greater MetroWest, NJ. During September and October, students will have a rotating schedule of courses led by Mrs. Ilyse Shainbrown, Federation’s Director of Holocaust Education. We are deeply grateful to Jewish Federation of Greater MetroWest, NJ for making this pilot program — and Mrs. Shainbrown — available to Golda Och Academy. 

 

Following this initial rotation, we are offering the opportunity for students to engage in two projects that will provide a human dimension to the lessons of the Holocaust: Names, Not Numbers Holocaust Documentary Film Project or the Jewish Federation’s Adopt a Survivor program. 

 

Names, Not Numbers is an intergenerational oral history film project that transforms the traditional study of the Holocaust into an experiential program. Created by award-winning educator Tova Fish-Rosenberg, 2022-23 will mark GOA’s 6th year participating in this project which allows students to create an emotional connection to history. The project also enables students to work with professional filmmakers and journalists to learn valuable interviewing, filming and editing skills. Students will have the opportunity to work in groups to create a film documenting a Holocaust survivor’s story. In addition to the student-created documentary, a professional filmmaker documents the students’ journey throughout the process and incorporates all of the survivors’ stories in a final documentary film to be showcased at the end of the year.  

 

Class Adopt-A-Survivor is a program designed by the Jewish Federation of Greater MetroWest to preserve and perpetuate the incredible and inspirational stories of Holocaust survivors. Through this program, a class, with the guidance of their teacher, will become familiar with a Holocaust survivor’s life before, during, and after the Holocaust to create a project that tells the survivor’s story and pledges to continue to tell their story in the years to come. Each participating group will be assigned one survivor to meet with. After hearing the story completely, the group will complete a project on the survivor’s experience. This project will be developed and created as a collaborative effort and will be showcased upon completion.

 

We are thrilled to be enhancing our Holocaust education at GOA thanks to the tremendous support of our Federation.