From the Middle: Voices of the Voiceless PBL

Project Based Learning in the Content Area: 

Topic:  Holocaust and Speeches

Driving Question: How do we keep historical stories alive? What effects come from rash judgements?

Project Summary: Students will research stories of Holocaust victims.  Students will write speeches, in their own words, from the perspective of a Holocaust victim. Students will read the play “The Diary of Anne Frank” and relate common themes from the time period.

Mr. Rude and Mrs. Egemo worked on a collaborative PBL project.  8th grade students have been working on the Voices for the Voiceless project for a couple weeks. Our students were focused on keeping alive the stories of the Holocaust, as many survivors have passed away over time.  This has been a joint effort between both Mrs. Egemo's Literacy class and Mr. Rude's Social Studies class.  The students started with primary source research. The bulk of it was done through reading first hand accounts and interviews from survivors. We also had support from the Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center as they sent us a trunk full of resources.  A huge thank you to Mr. Jurrens for coming across this resource and forwarding it to Mr. Rude.  

Once research concluded, the students wrote speeches and narratives that call attention to the experiences of Holocaust survivors.  Some were written as narratives about Jews being captured, others were about the experience of being in the camps, and a few even examined the role of Allied soldiers that came upon the camps and liberated them.  Some of our students wrote speeches, which not only addressed the abhorrent treatment of those affected by the Holocaust, but also made a call to action for people to remember and apply the lessons learned.

Finally, the students used their oratory skills to craft and hone their narratives and speeches for public presentations.  The students presented them in the auditorium, on stage, and with a microphone during this last week.  In the lead up to the presentations students had an opportunity to work with Mr. Rude's Oratory Teacher Artist, Heidi Fortune.  The students delivered well crafted, and engaging speeches.  This project will lead into a project that starts in January, in which the students will take on a social injustice topic to write an argumentative essay, which in turn will be crafted into a speech.  Our students will have an opportunity to use these speeches to compete for a chance to go to Washington D.C. to participate in the Ford's Theater Oratory Retreat in May.