Park Sixth Graders Create Holocaust Remembrance Museum

The sixth grade Language Arts classes at Park Middle School created a one-day Holocaust Remembrance Museum this week. While sixth graders study the Holocaust every year, this is the first year the teachers have asked them to create an exhibit showcasing what they've learned.

"They blew us away," said teacher Lori Skoller. "For 6th graders, the things they came up with, we couldn't believe it."

The students created everything from poetry and short stories to paintings and sculptures of concentration camps. Holocaust survivor Fred Spiegel even came to the school to speak with the classes.

"When we teach about it, we try to address that it's not about learning about one historical event, but learning how not to stereotype or bully, and how stereotyping and bullying can lead to awful things," Skoller said. "Some of the kids start off with a little bit of background from what they learn in fifth grade, but when we started some had never even heard about [the Holocaust]. By the end they all really got it."

In written reflections of what they've learned, students expressed the lessons to be learned from history.

"I learned that we must continue leaning about the Holocaust because no one would want this terrible mark in history to happen again," one student wrote.

"Before this," wrote another, "I didn't even know what the word Holocaust meant, but now if someone came up to me and asked what the Holocaust is I could talk to them all day and still not be done explaining."

Teachers Jamie Aitkens, Jody Logan, Barbara McGuage, Luren Share, Sue Zazzara and Michelle Arminio, along with Skoller, organized the event.

Board of Education member David Gornbuoff stopped by on Monday, and later e-mailed Skoller to say, "I can tell you that the thought, dedication and work that your team and the students put into this project is up to the standards of any student work I have seen. It is obvious to me that they truly understand and grasp the concepts that they have studied and their importance to our society."   

"There's a lot of great stuff going on in the school," Skoller said, "but we're particularly proud of this."

Gorbunoff agrees. "I have suggested to Dr. Hayes that if possible this exhibit be moved to city hall or our public library," he wrote, "so the entire community can recognize the important learning that is taking place in your classrooms." 

A wise sixth grader at Park understands that the last two months of studying and learning about the Holocaust will stick with them for years to come.

"We must continue to learn about the Holocaust," the student wrote. "Not only does it teach us about these horrid actions so we will never repeat them again, it teaches us life lessons, and those lessons, we will use forever."