Lesson Overview

After the insurmountable loss wreaked on the Jewish world from the Holocaust, an estimated 140,000 Jewish survivors immigrated to the United States. The world that they knew before was no more and survivors now had to confront the daunting challenges of building a life in a new country. Learning a new language, pursuing an education, and entering the workforce, were all projects to undertake while carrying the psychic weight of post-genocidal trauma. As a whole, survivors demonstrated strength and an ability to regenerate their lives in the years and decades following the Holocaust. Survivors’ lives did not end in 1945. There were still many chapters left to live in America.

In this lesson, students will learn about the experiences of Holocaust survivors after World War II in the United States, moving the focus beyond survivors’ testimony and towards an understanding of the subsequent stages of their lives as they went about the task of pursuing life in America. Students will focus on the themes of strength and regeneration while examining survivors’ biographies before engaging in a close reading exercise that culminates with crafting an inspirational statement, modelled after the words of encouragement given to a Holocaust survivor. Through an extension activity, the lesson invites students to contemplate intergenerational trauma, experienced among descendants of Holocaust survivors.