A Light in the Darkness: Janusz Korczak, His Orphans, and the Holocaust by Albert Marrin-
Reviewed by Abril Rodriguez, Vanessa Rodriguez, Philip Risteski, Max Rutschke, and Cole Schneider
Cover of the Book (Image from
Amazon)
Review:
Marrin is an expert researcher. His latest book, A Light in the Darkness, has over 30 pages of notes and several pages of selected sources backing up the details contained in his book. Ostensibly, the book is a biography of Janusz Korczak, a pediatrician, author and playwright who created an orphanage for young children. This book is so much more, however. Korczak had multiple opportunities to escape the ghetto and death at the Treblinka concentration camp, but refused to the leave the children he loved. He asked if the children would be kept safe and when learning that there was no guarantee, Korczak replied, “it is best that I keep the children with me.” His life is set in direct contrast with the horrific acts of Adolf Hitler and his fellow Nazis who considered Jewish children vermin and one of the most important targets of the Nazi Final Solution. Hitler and Himmler believed that Judaism was in the children’s “blood” and “souls” and that “even the child in the cradle must be trampled down like a poisonous toad.” Hitler’s systematic method of dehumanizing the Jewish people, the mentally ill, etc. is explored at depth. The book also explores how typical Germans were caught up in the racist ideas of Hitler (and used those to justify horrible atrocities), along with how German children were sacrificed in the war in inappropriate ways (many Hitler Youth were sent to the front lines in the final days of the war). Meanwhile, Janusz Korczak’s legacy lives on in Europe and worldwide; he helped draft the United Nations’ Declaration of the Rights of the Child. A Light in the Darkness is an outstanding nonfiction book about the dangers of racism and fanaticism and about the importance of valuing children.
Biography:
“Albert Marrin: Penguin Random House.” PenguinRandomhouse.com, www.penguinrandomhouse.com/authors/153426/albert-marrin.
Albert Marrin, an 84-year-old young adult nonfiction writer, has written more than thirty books in his life and is more than qualified to write about history. In an interview with the National Endowment for the Humanities, Marrin says, “Kids are very bright. I’m not going to write down. If anything, I’ll have them read up to me”. This quote perfectly encapsulates Marin’s writing style throughout the course of A Light in the Darkness, one that places history and the truth as it is without diminishing certain elements of the story. Marrin started as a professor of history after writing some novels but shortly after becoming a professor, he quickly noticed that he wanted to continue telling stories relating to history. His young adult literature career began in the late 1970’s with his first YA novel titled, Overlord: D‑Day and the Invasion of Europe. He continued to write similar books because he was fascinated that people were sending him fan letters and told the interviewer that “I saw they were interested in what I had to say”.
Marrin credits his storytelling skills to his father who was a soldier in Russia during the Russian Revolution and told young Albert Marrin about his experiences in the Red Army. His father had made sure he read many books as a child and this helped him achieve the milestone of become the first person in his family to attend college where he met historian R.K. Webb who made him realize his passion for history.
Marrin attempts to include as many historically accurate facts in each of his novels to make sure his readers feel immersed in his storytelling. For example, he offers vivid descriptions of both people and landscapes describing “the Pueblo Indians, he explains that their name, ‘Anasazi,’ means ‘the ancients,’ and that they arrived in the Southwest three thousand years ago or more and hunted mastodons and bison ‘twice the size of their modern descendants’” in his novel Empires Lost and Won: The Spanish Heritage in the Southwest.
When writing his novels, he “researches as if I was researching for the adult general reader” and makes sure he tells story in a way that his readers will not forget. He finishes his interview with a lesson about history claiming, “Sure, history can be a tool for understanding, but it can also be used as a weapon. Historical memory fosters grudges. History continues to draw blood.”
Source: “Albert Marrin.” The National Endowment for the Humanities, www.neh.gov/about/awards/national-humanities-medals/albert-marrin.
Instructional Resources:
This lecture provides an example of what two Holocaust survivors went through at an early age in their lives, and gives context to the horrors of the era.
This website is dedicated entirely to exploring the ideals and perspective of Janusz Korczak, along with providing excerpts and further contacts to other associations affiliated with Korczak.
A website providing further information on the Holocaust and its many ghettos and concentration camps, the specific page linked gives more information on the Warsaw Ghetto in German-occupied Poland. This information ranges from population numbers, death counts, life style, and overall history of the ghetto and its inhabitants.
A gallery of images that give an in depth look at what the living conditions were like within the Warsaw Ghetto, along with images regarding and showing the treatment of Jews under the Reich’s occupation.
This website not only provides a biography of the author Albert Marrin but also details some of the other achievements of his life, along with a selection of other books written by him.
This article explains more about what the Holocaust was and the main events in its timeline. It also gives information regarding the lasting impact the Holocaust has on the world and the legacies it left behind in the survivors that live today to tell their stories.
The following website lists several tips for those who are going to be teaching about the Holocaust. Some examples of such guidelines are that teachers must define what the Holocaust was, teachers must not romanticize the history of it, and that teachers should try to make their students understand that the numbers they see account for actual, real people that were affected by this event.
This article supplies critical information of the treatment of children during the time of the Holocaust. It explores how they were viewed by the Nazis and also how some survived the Holocaust through a process of being hidden from the world.
Instructional Activity:
Preview:
For this lesson, students will be learning about the Holocaust through reading Marrin's book. The content ahead might be triggering for some students, but it is an important historical tragedy that students will learn or have learned through their history class. Marrin's book is one of the many pieces written on Holocaust literature, and it will serve to expand the conversation while teaching students how to analyze interdisciplinary text. The lesson should at least take a week to cover and students will be asked to discuss their prior knowledge to WWII as a class, keep an account of their thoughts on the lesson through their SKWL chart, and think critically in groups when completing an assignment on Holocaust propaganda. On the last day of class, students will be shown a video of your choice (there are six options under the instructional lesson plan), to give them further insight on the Holocaust as they wrap up their thought on their SKWL chart.
California Common Core Standards:
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.9-10.1
Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text. CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.9-10.2
Determine a central idea of a text and analyze its development over the course of the text, including how it emerges and is shaped and refined by specific details; provide an objective summary of the text. CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.9-10.4
Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, including figurative, connotative, and technical meanings; analyze the cumulative impact of specific word choices on meaning and tone (e.g., how the language of a court opinion differs from that of a newspaper). CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.9-10.5
Analyze in detail how an author's ideas or claims are developed and refined by particular sentences, paragraphs, or larger portions of a text (e.g., a section or chapter). CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.9-10.7
Analyze various accounts of a subject told in different mediums (e.g., a person's life story in both print and multimedia), determining which details are emphasized in each account. CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.9-10.8
Delineate and evaluate the argument and specific claims in a text, assessing whether the reasoning is valid and the evidence is relevant and sufficient; identify false statements and fallacious reasoning. CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.9-10.10
By the end of grade 9, read and comprehend literary nonfiction in the grades 9-10 text complexity band proficiently, with scaffolding as needed at the high end of the range. By the end of grade 10, read and comprehend literary nonfiction at the high end of the grades 9-10 text complexity band independently and proficiently. Resources and Preparation:
Teachers should first prepare themselves by thoroughly reading A Light in the Darkness: Janusz Korczak, His Orphans, and the Holocaust by Albert Marrin by Albert Marrin.
They must become familiar with the main events that occur in the text and be prepared to answer questions surrounding racial violence. Attached below is a link to a PowerPoint that should be used as an introduction to the Holocaust.
THE HOLOCAUST (npd117.net)
The only handouts needed for the class are the SKWL chart and the Propaganda Activity.
Image depicts a caricature of a Jewish man with a hand pointing a finger at him (taken from
ushmm.org).
Photograph of a Jewish man and woman wearing the obligatory Star of David on their coats (taken from
racked.com).
Propaganda Activity:
This activity is divided into two sections. Section one is formatted to reintroduce what propaganda is. Section two is designed to be completed in groups in order to further discuss how Nazi Propaganda aided in advancing the war. Each question is posed to connect back to the textbook, novel, and PowerPoint to demonstrate each student’s understanding of the lesson.
PROPAGANDA_WW2Instructional Plan:
Day 1:
Start your lesson by handing out the SKWL chart. Then show your class the 3 pictures from above with no context/additional text. It's important that you only show the pictures because they will be filling out the S section of their SKWL chart and describing what they see or what they think of when they see those pictures. Give them 8 minutes to do this, and then go to your blackboard/whiteboard and write down the word "Holocaust". Ask your students to write this word on their SKWL chart where it says "Topic", and then ask them to raise their hand if they know anything about this word. This part is to take count of how many people are aware of the Holocaust and is a quick survey before asking your students to fill in the K section of their chart. To those who don't know what the Holocaust is, prompt them to write down what they know about WWII instead (can be what they've learned in prior history classes, seen in the media, read somewhere, etc.). Give your students 6 minutes to do this before pulling out a PowerPoint that has background history surrounding the Holocaust. Make sure to let your students know that the information moving forward can be triggering, and if they need to talk about making special arrangements with you concerning the material, to let you know that you're there for them and open to discussing it. As you go through your PowerPoint, make sure that you dedicate the last 15-20 minutes of class to reading the prologue with your students. You can do a popcorn reading or read it aloud for your students to follow. Lastly, assign them chapter 1 of Marrin's book as their homework and tell them to bring any questions they have about the reading to class tomorrow.
Day 2:
Open your lesson by discussing chapter 1 with your class. Ask your students to fill in the W section of their chart after the opening discussion. The W part of their chart should be filled in with anything they want to know/wonder about the topic. It can be anything so encourage your students to write down whatever comes to mind. Let them do this for 6 minutes before resuming your PowerPoint lecture. Again, use the last 15-20 minutes to read the next chapter with your class. Give them some tips on how to annotate and model an example for them. They will be annotating chapter 2 for homework which will help them for day 3's in class activity.
Day 3:
Move the desks around in your classroom, or get help from your first period class, to make small groups. Your students will be working in groups of 3-4 on the propaganda worksheet above. This activity will help them think critically about the role that propaganda played in advancing Hitler's Nazi ideology, how Marrin debunks or sheds light on what the posters were actually promoting, and asking your students to relate back to their own experiences seeing propaganda. In their groups, students will work together to fill in the worksheet, and then they will present their findings during the class discussion. Be mindful to your time, however, as you want to save 10-15 minutes on reading the next chapter of the book. The rest of what you don't finish of chapter 3 will be for your students to read and annotate at home.
Day 4:
Have your class discuss chapter 3 and what they learned about the treatment of Jewish people during Hitler's reign. You can write some of their ideas on your board for reference to your next activity. After the class discussion, have your students watch video #2 or #3 from the list of Holocaust related videos below. Let them know that they should be taking notes because they're going to be writing about the video in relation to what they've read so far in Marrin's book. The activity will be done in pairs, and students will be writing three paragraphs in total. The first paragraph will be about Marrin's book, the second one will be about the video, and the third will be students connecting the two mediums to each other. Students will use one quote each for the first and third paragraph and turn it in once they're done. If there's time at the end of the activity, start reading chapter 4 with them and assign the rest for homework.
Day 5:
In class, read chapter 5 from pages 239-250 to get to the end of Dr. Korczak's story. Summarize the rest of the book in a PowerPoint and let your students watch another one of the videos from below. You are setting up your students to be able to write for the last section of their SKWL chart. After the video, have a quick class discussion asking students to share their thoughts on it, and then let them fill out the L part of their chart. Let them put their final thoughts on the class lectures, readings, class activities, and videos before collecting their charts.
Holocaust Videos for the lesson:
Auschwitz with Nobel Laureate and Holocaust Survivor Elie Wiesel | The Oprah Winfrey Show | OWN (03:10)
Kids Meet a Holocaust Survivor | Kids Meet | HiHo Kids (10:25)
From the 60 Minutes archives: Survivors of Josef Mengele’s twin experiments (13:44)
Victim of Nazi twin experiments in Auschwitz | DW Documentary (42:26)
The Boy in the Striped Pajamas (01:34:00)
*Available on Hulu
Life Is Beautiful (02:02:00)
*Available on HBO Max
Bibliography
THE HOLOCAUST - North Palos School District 117. www.npd117.net/cms/lib02/IL01001910/Centricity/Domain/309/Holocaust%20PowerPoint.pdf.
Albert Marrin.” The National Endowment for the Humanities, www.neh.gov/about/awards/national-humanities-medals/albert-marrin.
