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Pupils hear descriptions of Holocaust experiences

Julie Taggart, SEELB Advisory Officer for History, addresses the Board members of 'Facing History and Ourselves' during their visit to Friends' School, Lisburn.

Julie Taggart, SEELB Advisory Officer for History, addresses the Board members of 'Facing History and Ourselves' during their visit to Friends' School, Lisburn.

A SURVIVOR of the Holocaust and a man involved in the liberation of a Nazi concentration camp have told pupils at Friends School of their experiences.

The two Americans were members of an 88 strong group from a project entitled 'Facing History and Ourselves' which offers an online campus, which is used as part of the school's History Syllabus.

Their talks, which everyone present found 'amazing and very emotional', came after the visitors watched two Powerpoint presentations about the pupils' response to the course.

Since February all Year 10 pupils at Friends have been studying events in Germany under Hitler and the Nazi Party.

Having already read novels connected with the Holocaust in English classes during Years Eight and Nine they had some knowledge of the basic facts.

The course concentrated on the issue of why the Holocaust was allowed to happen.

The young people learned it was not only Jews who were persecuted by the Nazis - others suffered horribly too. Year 10 also looked at how after the Second World War the United Nations was created and a list of basic rights was drawn up that would apply to the world's entire population.

In Citizenship classes they looked at these rights in more detail and found it reassuring that nothing so terrible would ever be allowed to happen again.

However, their reassurance was short lived when the final part of the History project led the pupils to the computer rooms where they had to search for information about two countries: Rwanda and Darfur.

They were shocked to discover the Holocaust wasn't the last time man's inhumanity to man was expressed in violence. It is still happening.

neil.greenlees@jpress.co.uk

Ulster Star
27/06/2008