Recently, I was helping a 17 year old student "get into" the book The Hiding Place by Corrie ten Boom. In other words,we were reading the first chapter together. This student's native language is Chinese so the vocabulary, sentence structure, and long descriptions make the first chapter of this extremely difficult.
I was asking her some questions about Hitler, Nazi Germany, and the Holocaust and was was met with blank stares. At first I thought we were having vocabulary issues for words like "camps", Jews, "kill", but as I continued with questions, I realized she understood the words, but had no knowledge of the actual history regarding WWII and the Holocaust. I was surprised. I remember reading The Diary of Anne Frank in 8th grade, and from today's research, just learned has been translated into 70 languages and published in more than 60 countries including places like Thailand, Malaysia's neighbor to the north, China, ancestral home of many of my students, and Turkey, also predominately Muslim and, as such, discounting my idea that maybe Muslim countries did not read about the Holocaust.
Her innocence regarding the Holocaust got me wondering...
Is this a taboo topic because it demonstrates the worst evil in mankind and parents want to shelter their children from these horrors for as long as possible?
Are these students so focused on math and science that they do not have time for the subjects of history or social studies?
Are there other world atrocities of more relevance to them of which I have no knowledge?
After a night's pondering about this student's lack of background on the Holocaust, I asked the principal if I'd understood her correctly or if maybe there was a word (or words) in Chinese that would help clarify the subject. He said "no" and that I'd understood the situation correctly. Nazi Germany and anything about the extermination of Jews is not taught in the public school Malaysian curriculum. Students have little knowledge of WWII besides the Japanese Occupation of Malaya. He suggested the reason is because of the establishment of Israel and Muslim hatred of the Israels for "stealing land from the Palestinians" and, because this is a predominately Muslim country, the Holocaust is not taught.
His statement "stealing land from the Palestinians" got my attention and made me delve deeper. I'm the first to admit that I know very little about the establishment of Israel after WWII. A quick "Google" search yielded far more information that I could digest in a couple of hours (that's how long I got side-tracked)..I tried to discount sites that appeared biased with hidden agendas and hoped to just find just facts...much easier said than done. Words and themes like Zionist Movement, establishment of a Jewish State, British setting up the government, displaced Palestinians, Israel as largest recipient of US foreign aid, sanctions, wars, power, and money (aren't the last two always at the root of all evil??) In other words, many wrongs don't lead up to many rights...
What my brief research did was reinforce my love of and hunger for reading books like The Hiding Place and The Diary of Anne Frank because they teach hope and courage and bravery in the face of evil and despair. Reading gives the freedom and flexibility to broaden and deepen an understanding of the world in order, one would hope, to make good/moral decisions.
Most importantly, this little detour into "why" has made me less shocked by what my student did not know and even more shocked by what I don't.
I guess that's what we call "learning from our students."
I was asking her some questions about Hitler, Nazi Germany, and the Holocaust and was was met with blank stares. At first I thought we were having vocabulary issues for words like "camps", Jews, "kill", but as I continued with questions, I realized she understood the words, but had no knowledge of the actual history regarding WWII and the Holocaust. I was surprised. I remember reading The Diary of Anne Frank in 8th grade, and from today's research, just learned has been translated into 70 languages and published in more than 60 countries including places like Thailand, Malaysia's neighbor to the north, China, ancestral home of many of my students, and Turkey, also predominately Muslim and, as such, discounting my idea that maybe Muslim countries did not read about the Holocaust.
Her innocence regarding the Holocaust got me wondering...
Is this a taboo topic because it demonstrates the worst evil in mankind and parents want to shelter their children from these horrors for as long as possible?
Are these students so focused on math and science that they do not have time for the subjects of history or social studies?
Are there other world atrocities of more relevance to them of which I have no knowledge?
After a night's pondering about this student's lack of background on the Holocaust, I asked the principal if I'd understood her correctly or if maybe there was a word (or words) in Chinese that would help clarify the subject. He said "no" and that I'd understood the situation correctly. Nazi Germany and anything about the extermination of Jews is not taught in the public school Malaysian curriculum. Students have little knowledge of WWII besides the Japanese Occupation of Malaya. He suggested the reason is because of the establishment of Israel and Muslim hatred of the Israels for "stealing land from the Palestinians" and, because this is a predominately Muslim country, the Holocaust is not taught.
His statement "stealing land from the Palestinians" got my attention and made me delve deeper. I'm the first to admit that I know very little about the establishment of Israel after WWII. A quick "Google" search yielded far more information that I could digest in a couple of hours (that's how long I got side-tracked)..I tried to discount sites that appeared biased with hidden agendas and hoped to just find just facts...much easier said than done. Words and themes like Zionist Movement, establishment of a Jewish State, British setting up the government, displaced Palestinians, Israel as largest recipient of US foreign aid, sanctions, wars, power, and money (aren't the last two always at the root of all evil??) In other words, many wrongs don't lead up to many rights...
What my brief research did was reinforce my love of and hunger for reading books like The Hiding Place and The Diary of Anne Frank because they teach hope and courage and bravery in the face of evil and despair. Reading gives the freedom and flexibility to broaden and deepen an understanding of the world in order, one would hope, to make good/moral decisions.
Most importantly, this little detour into "why" has made me less shocked by what my student did not know and even more shocked by what I don't.
I guess that's what we call "learning from our students."
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