| OUR EDUCATIONAL CENTER |
| Additional Manpower |
Aya Shacham nee Friedlaender started working in our educational center. In addition to routine work Aya will be responsible for special projects e.g. study days for teachers on the subject of ghetto Terezin and the Holocaust. She will also further our cooperation with other institutions in our district. In the future she will be the contact person between Beit Terezin and the second and third generations.
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| Study Days |
From January until December 1999 we held 120 study days for high-schoolers, youth delegations to Poland and the Czech Republic and for teachers. There were altogether about 6000 participants. The study days were supported by the Youth Department of the Isr. Ministry of Education.
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In addition we had 12 special study days for teachers and journalists from Germany.
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| Special Study Days |
A delegation of the Young Leadership of the United Jewish Appeal, about 120 students, visited Beit Terezin on December 23, 1999. They met 20 of the members of our first generation who were in the ghetto, soldiers of the Jewish Brigade and also representatives of the second generation. The delegation - in small groups - discussed with our members questions of Holocaust remembrance. Before visiting Beit Terezin the delegation was in the Czech Republic and in Terezin. The meeting was very interesting and exciting.
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| "To Be in Terezin" |
This school-year's educational activities connected to the internet site "To Be in Terezin" start out these days. The number of documents at the site is now about 600 - including pictures, an interactive map, music fragments, research papers and sources translated from the Czech and from the German. This year there are much more classes taking part in the project, encompassing about 800 high school students. Finally, the students will prepare papers related to subjects of ghetto Terezin. The site was created and is maintained by Beit Terezin in cooperation with the Center for Educational Technology.
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| The Training of Teachers and Instructors of Delegations to Eastern Europe |
will commence in the first months of 2000, organized by Beit Terezin together with "Amalnet" (the organization of "Amal" schools in Israel). It will consist of 6 meetings, each 4 hours, and one whole day at Beit Terezin. This is a pilot project of our educational center.
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| New Internet Site for Holocaust Instruction Together with "Amalnet" |
Two teams - one of Beit Terezin and one of "Amalnet" - began to put together a site, enabling remote instruction. It will deal with the fate of 4 Jewish families from different countries, from the end of the 19th century until 1948. This is a new and important undertaking, financed by the "Amal" educational net. We hope to finish it during this year.
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| A Guide for Visitors to Terezin |
to aid instructors, teachers and students, who visit Terezin in the framework of youth groups touring Holocaust sites in Eastern Europe was published by Beit Terezin in cooperation with the Youth Department of the Isr. Ministry of Education. It came out in October 1999 (Hebr.), titled "Be-ikvotehem" (In their steps) and is the result of tireless work by Chana Drori, Yehuda Huppert and Anita Tarsi from Beit Terezin and Yael Bernholz of the Ministry of Education. The guide leads one through 28 sites of the former Theresienstadt ghetto. The sites are explained by text, testimonies, illustrations from those times and contemporary photographs. Further there is a comprehensive map of the ghetto, a historical essay by Ruth Bondy about Czech Jewry and ghetto Terezin and a table of the major events during the Nazi occupation of the Cz. Republic and the Protectorate Bohemia and Moravia starting with the occupation of the Sudetenland in October 1938 until November 1945, when the last Jew left Terezin. The user-friendly and beautiful graphic design is by Orni Drori.
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The deputy director of the Isr. Ministry of Education and head of the Youth Department Abraham Oded Cohen, who supported the project from its start, wrote in the prologue: "… the guide follows in the footsteps of the Jews in the ghetto, touching the most important sites …" The described sites are children's homes, old peoples housing, the railway siding, the central hospital, the cemetery, the vegetable plots and more. On September 28, 1999, the Ministry of Education together with Beit Terezin organized a study day for teachers accompanying classes to Terezin. The Tel Aviv newspaper "Maariv" wrote on October 12, 1999, about the booklet. Among the many positive reactions received by Beit Terezin following the publishing of the guide is a letter by the chief inspector for the teaching of history of the Isr. Ministry of Education Michael Yaron, who writes: "Well done! It's a long time since I saw a publication on such a high level… " (Available at Beit Terezin - NIS 50.- not including postage)
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| History, Remembrance and Music |
Beit Theresienstadt in cooperation with Jeunesses Musicales in Germany and with the Regional Council Emek Hefer organized in October 1999 days of Theresienstadt music and workshops for young musicians from Germany and from Israel. The "Masters Course for Chamber Music, Piano, Solo and Voice" was directed by the head of the Schwerin conservatory Volker Ahmels and by Anita Tarsi of Beit Terezin. The first part of the meeting was held in the building which housed the "Wannsee Conference". The second part was at Beit Terezin, Kibbutz Givat Hayim-Ihud. Among the artists instructing the young musicians in the performance of musical works from Theresienstadt was Prof. Edith Kraus, Israel, who - as a young pianist - had played on the only piano in the ghetto, Prof. Paul Kling, Victoria, Canada, who had played the violin in the ghetto, Prof. Konrad Richter, Stuttgart, Germany, Prof. David Bloch, Tel Aviv university and Prof. Emily Berendsen, Tel Aviv.
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In addition to music there were also lectures about ghetto Theresienstadt and the testimony of Ruth Elias about music in the ghetto and about her fate in the Holocaust. And then there was the meeting of the young musicians from Germany and from Israel. Concluding the event were 2 concerts - one at the "Vienna Hall" in Givat Hayim-Ihud and the other at the "Clairemont Hall" of the Music Academy of Tel Aviv university. The repertoire of both concerts included works by composers from ghetto Terezin: Pavel Haas, Viktor Ullmann, Gideon Klein and Hans Krasa - and also works by Mozart, Mendelsohn, Brahms and others, which were performed in the ghetto.
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| Holocaust Instruction |
In the framework of the second international meeting on this subject, held from October 10, until October 14, 1999, at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem there were many lectures and workshops, dealing mainly with curricula for different age groups. It was a mutual inspiration of educators working in this field, from abroad and in Israel. Beit Terezin had a stand there, displaying our various activities and publications. Further the didactic internet site produced by Beit Terezin in cooperation with the "Center for Educational Technology" - "To Be in Terezin" - was introduced. For those interested in the subject, the address is: www.cet.ac.il/history/terezin
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| Youth Excursions to Poland |
In November 1999 it became known in Israel, that high school students from the North of the country after a tour of extermination camps in Poland, invited strip-teasers to their hotel room, on the last evening of the trip. A stormy discussion developed in the media, questioning the excursions as such, too. (Some 10.000 high school students from Israel visit the memorial sites annually, often including the former ghetto Terezin and Prague in the tours. The trip costs $1000.- to $1500.- per pupil and not everybody can afford it. The sometimes superficial preparation of the delegations was also criticized.
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In this context the director of Beit Terezin Anita Tarsi remarks: "Surely such excursions must be prepared thoroughly - thematically and also as to the behaviour of the participants. A possible solution would be to send smaller delegations and to better prepare both the students and the instructors."
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| Guide for the Visitor to Terezin - in German |
In October 1999 the publishers "Vitalis" in Prague brought out a German translation of the guide, titled "Theresienstadt - ein Wegweiser". The booklet was authored by Chana Drori and Yehuda Huppert and translated from the Hebrew by Dan Weinstein. It is intended to acquaint the German-speaking public, who visit Terezin in ever growing numbers, with life in the ghetto and to enable them to better understand the fate of its inmates. The edition was financed by Kibbutz Hahotrim. The first part consists of 10 chapters dealing with important subjects of life in the ghetto e.g. hunger, transports, children's homes. The second part describes in short 29 various sites in the ghetto with testimonies and 50 illustrations. (Shortly also available at Beit Terezin).
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| Tasteless Caricature |
In September 1999 the newspaper "Maariv" published a caricature, where an interviewer asks a Holocaust survivor: "Is it true that you were forced in ghetto Warsaw to masturbate?" Jirka Bloch (Zikhron Yaakov) demanded a reaction by our association. Our chairman Eli Lawental wrote on October 18, 1999 both to the Isr. minister of education Mr.Yossi Sarid and to the chairman of the committee of newspaper editors Mr. Hayim Zadok and requested their statements on the matter. Mr. Sarid answered, that the caricature is shocking. Mr. Zadok did not find an ethical offence, at the most he saw it to be in bad taste. "Maariv" informed the committee, that offended readers contacted the caricaturist and were answered by him directly.
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