This week, 80 years ago…

80 years ago on June 22, Operation Barbarossa was unleashed – Germany’s brutal invasion of the Soviet Union. Einsatzgruppen of the Security Police followed on behind the ground forces. Its main function was to hunt down and murder every Jewish man, woman and child shooting them in their hometowns, villages, in nearby forests or upon open spaces.  Roma people and those perceived to be communist and Soviet officials were also targeted. The Einsatzgruppen were helped by thousands of others including military and non-military police units and ordinary local people living in the regions. In one case at a ravine outside Kiev at Babi Yar Einsatzgruppe C shot 33,771 Jews across two days.

The Centre’s Hodder textbook Understanding the Holocaust at Key stage 3: How and why did it happen? (Foster, Pearce, Karayianni & McCord) a carefully presented but deeply disturbing eye-witness account of this mass killing is given by Dina Pronicheva. Here is a link to the Centre’s course on the relatively new, research informed textbook, which is available to take at any time, online.

You may also like to check out the latest findings of our research that were released this week which raises fundamental questions about the most appropriate and educationally beneficial age for students to learn about the Holocaust.

Online courses and seminars:

I would like to draw your attention to a course on The Kindertransport which you may be interested in attending. The course run by The Parkes Institute for the Study of Jewish/non-Jewish relations will run from 5th July 2021 to 23rd July 2021 and will consist of a series of webinars and a chance to participate in online discussion boards. It will be led by experts on the Kindertransport and Holocaust education from within the Parkes Institute for the Study of Jewish/non-Jewish Relations Participating will open up exciting new avenues of knowledge, introduce new ways that we can explore the Kindertransport and this knowledge can used in a classroom. Read more

We also have an exciting online seminar of our own running on 30th June at 5-7pm entitled:  Visual Sources in the Teaching of History by expert scholar Dr Tom Haward. Read more

Tribute to Holocaust Survivors.

Finally, and to conclude on an uplifting note, tomorrow (June 26^th, 2021) is the launch of Holocaust Survivors Day. I am sure you join me and the staff of the Centre in paying tribute to these remarkable people. Read more

Wishing you well.