How Exciting!

I'm so excited about this blog (and the seminar)! One of my goals for this seminar is to develop ongoing discussions between my students and others from across the nation. I think it would be an amazing way to see varied perspectives and new ideas. These discussions could exist in multiple ways - book talks, question/answer posts, shared brainstorming for appreciating and recognizing humanitarianism...anything is possible.

Anytime we can open our students' eyes to other ways of thinking it is a learning experience. In addition, this helps to cut through cultural beliefs and traditional paths of thought. My students live in a town of just over 300 people and they become insulated in their thinking. They are also comfortable with one another and their discussions turn in somewhat predictable patterns. Opening the virtual door for extended communication is very exciting!

Thanks for sharing this idea Larry!

~Danielle

Welcome to the Blog!

I am excited to be selected as a participant in the Holocaust Education Seminar. As a high school teacher that uses blogs extensively in the classroom, I thought a blog would be a neat way to interact with one another while we go through the seminar, and who knows, maybe afterward. I like blogs because they are an easy way to have discussions, you can post links to interesting web sources, and it is easy to share pictures, audio podcasts, and videos. My students love them, and hopefully, so will we. I want to extend an invitation to be a part of this blog to all participants in the Holocaust Education Seminar. There is no pressure to post anything. You may observe and see what happens, but I would love to have anyone who feels like posting to jump on in!

I'd like to start things off by sharing a website with you that was reccomended to me by a summer institute participant. The name of the web sit is Life in a Jar - The Irena Sendler Project. It is a website detailing the story of four high school girls working on a National History Day project. They discovered a lady in Warsaw, Poland who hid children during Nazi occupation. The girls eventually wrote a play and have performed it in the US and Europe. The project has become internationally reknown and was even nominated for a Nobel Peace prize in 2007. It is definitely worth a look. Guideposts magazine just did a story about it called Class Act.

I hope to hear from all of you soon!


A photo of Irena Sendler