This workshop is led by Cornélia Strickler, Head of Education at the Montreal Holocaust Museum. It is based on a Holocaust survivor’s story and includes the analysis of primary sources. It begins with a brief, interactive PowerPoint presentation on the Holocaust, followed by video excerpts of a survivor’s testimony.  Using inquiry-based methods, Cornélia engages students in hands-on activities with a range of primary sources, based on the main themes of each survivor’s story.

Through these workshops, students will:

• Learn about the Holocaust through the personal experience of a survivor
• Reflect on ethical and human rights issues
• Develop empathy
• Reflect on the responsibility of citizens to help people in need
• Develop their critical thinking skills
• Practice their communication skills 

Eva Kuper was born in Warsaw in 1940, shortly after the Nazi invasion of Poland. A few months after
her birth, her family was confined to the Warsaw ghetto. After her mother was deported, Eva and her father managed to escape from the ghetto. They survived the war in hiding.

For this workshop, each group is given a box containing 10 objects and documents, most of which are reproductions of objects and documents that belonged to children and teenagers who were in hiding during Nazi occupation. Students are invited to sort the objects into 3 categories: comforting objects that were safe to keep; comforting objects that were unsafe to keep; objects that were neither comforting nor safe to keep. Students then explain why their group chose to place each object within a specific category.

Cornélia Strickler holds a Master’s Degree in History and is the Montreal Holocaust Museum’s Head of Education. She has also held different positions at the Museum since 2009, from conducting guided tours to curating the museum’s oral history collection and developing digital resources such as online exhibits on the Holocaust and other genocides. She is currently responsible for training educators and creating pedagogical activities in close partnership with teachers that meet the requirements of the Quebec and Canadian curricula. She has presented at several national and international conferences on oral history and Holocaust education. 

Recommended for Grades 6 - 9