The current age group of my learners are preschoolers through second grade. Their prior knowledge may be nothing concerning the Holocaust, however some of the preschoolers through second graders that I am currently and will be teaching are familiar with Hanukkah, some in fact Jewish themselves, childen who has their own menorahs.

Objectives: 

To engage preschoolers through second graders in a way that helps them empathize with the owner of the menorah, Willy, and what happened to him during the Holocaust, as well as Willy's patients, their family, and the 6 million plus victims of the Holocaust.

Expand on this to personalize the lesson concerning their own objects representing their life, the objects and lives of others around them.

Sequence of Activities:

I believe that it would be good for the children to bring their menorahs to the lesson about the Holocaust to help them recognize the person that owned this was very similar to them and that the person that owned this was hurt by really bad people - that the owner of the menorah was no more just because they celebrated Hanukkah. Also they had to make a really important decision were they going to love other people more than themselves even if that meant the possibility that only their menorah may survive? I think that this can help the children to to begin to realize and experience empathy.

From a law enforcement perspective that even as a child they need to have awareness of what is happening around them and that they cannot trust everybody unfortunately. 

I think showing them this menorah with an age-appropriate explanation of Willy and his family as well as the patients he was caring for and then personalizing this menorah for children is important because it teaches them to love and value one another both in action concerning loving others more than yourself such as how can I help protect somebody, how can I help love somebody, how can I be humble and be kind to others. Young children are capable of discussing these questions and discussing how to be kind to others by respecting their toys and/or their menorahs, how to be a person of integrity even if that person is not around for a long time..how can you still be kind to their things? I think those are age appropriate lessons. Adding on to this discussion for preschoolers through second graders about respect can help them understand how hiding this menorah was not only loving, kind and respectful of Willy, his lifee, family, and his patients, but is also respectful of his culture, his religion and his ethnic group. 

Interestingly enough in Hebrew the meaning of the word Havel that is transliterated into Abel (Cain's brother, Adam and Eve's son), his name in Hebrew means breathe. I think that this discussion is important with the young children to help them stop and be quiet and listen, then ask them quietly to listen and see if we can we hear each other breathing. Can we hear each other's breathe, our Havel? I want to encourage children in this lesson to make a habit of listening for a person's breathe when someone is speaking to you or when you're even listening to a video, listen and you will hear their breath between their words this is part of the humanization process for all humans and something that little children can understand. This object lesson then is expanded about learning to value and love life, the life that G-d gave us as heard in the breathe. This lesson can further be built upon for young children about the value of breathe - that it is priceless. Breathe is something that we do not have permission to take from others except for in extreme law enforcement situations. Discussion of the breahe will continue with how it is evil for other people to take someone else's breath away from them simply because they do not love them or because they use a menorah, that is wrong. Discussing this with little children can also be expanded upon on how to love someone who's really different than you but who has breathe, they might use an object such as this menorah in their life for a holiday, that might seem strange to you or even disobedient because of the fire, but if they have breath you need to stop and ask them questions and be humble and choose to love others more than yourself. I think that these are appropriate level discussions that young children can understand. 

If they don't have a menorah themselves they probably have a favorite toy. I think asking them to bring it as a show and tell and then discussing the ethics of being kind and respectful to their toy in comparison to what would it look like if someone was not kind to your Menorah or was not kind to your toy…what if because you own that toy or that menorah somebody tried to hurt you just because you own that toy or that menorah?

I would then like to take the lesson towards animals. Is there anything that their pet owns? Do they have a collar, does their animal have an aquarium or a favorite toy, or have they observed a favorite pastime of their animal? I think that it's appropriate to teach children also to be respectful to and to love animals because of the close link between animal abuse and human abuse. Reflecting on their furry friends and other animals such as their fish, their breathe (their life), their objects (toys, clothes, aquariums). This lesson in all helps us to recognize that we are not the Creator of breathe, and we are not the taker of breathe, unless like I said in extreme law enforcement situations.

At this point we will discuss that these issues are what is deeply wrong behind the Holocaust and other genocide situations that have occurred in the past and are occurring currently in the world. The root of genocide being where people are not respecting the Creator of the breathe, nor loving those who have that breathe whether they are human or animal in the case of animal abuse. The antidoteto to hatred being love (I Corinthians 13) also is discussed through this lesson using objects and personal relationships to help children understand the extreme importance of being loving with humility toward others and animals, who have that breathe in other words who have life.

Engage all learners:

As explained in the sequence of activities for this lesson, engage learners by asking them to each bring a menorah, if they own one, a toy, and if they have a pet or pets for them to bring an object that belongs to one of their pets if applicable.

1. Question: look at the photograph and try to tell something about theowner  of the doll.

2. Learning about the Warsaw Ghetto - using the movies from youtube (at Yad Vashem's chanel) or other informations:

- where the ghetto was - see the maps,

- how many people did live there (about 450 000 - the biggest one in Europe),

- how did Jews live there - about huger, diseases, flats,

- who was Emmanuel Ringelblum and Oneg Szabat group? why are they important for us?

3. Comming back to artefact - telling he story of Zofia Rosner who survived the Shoah - which is important if we want to tell about her to ypunger group of students - using he article on Yad Vashem's website.

The doll Zuzia helped Zosia to survive in lonely, dark times in the Warsaw Ghetto, when her mother was smuggling supplies. It was the gift from mother to daughter. Once she told: "You take care of your daughter during the day".

After the war Zofia took the doll with her to Israel. It could remember her about her mother who died shortly after war.