Thousands of students come through our doors every year here at the Nancy & David Wolf Holocaust & Humanity Center. The group of students who joined us for this episode is special, though, because they wrote books about their thoughts on being upstanders.
“You have to know not to judge the book by his cover, you have to actually go in depth to their into their character, into their heart.” — McKenzie Williams, Winton Hills Academy student
Julie Dellecave brought her class of 6th graders to visit us, and she knew she wanted to focus on upstander behavior with her students. Upstanders are people who stand up for themselves and others against injustice. Julie said of her students’ potential to be upstanders, “If we all just try in those little ways to be good, decent people, it’s going to make the whole world a better place.” After their visit, the class took the lesson a step further and formed small groups to write books based on their experiences. They worked after school to write, illustrate, and record a video narrating their books. These student projects so inspired us here at HHC that we wanted to share them.
In the book My Kind a young boy travels the world attempting to find people like him. Along his journey, he meets strangers who are kind and compassionate. He realizes everyone can be “his kind” if he accepts them.
Watch the students narrate My Kind https://drive.google.com/file/d/1RIOVTwSecaMrMi3ihv-qRGz0YhiuMiNt/view
In the book Human the main character is a nameless human who reflects on how people often harm each other. The authors remind us to lift each other up.
Watch the students narrate Humanhttps://drive.google.com/file/d/1UfH5CSjnmv2dkz-tyeIvDOFzy31h5Zh_/view
This episode is part of the Cynthia & Harold Guttman Center for Storytelling. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to make sure you don’t miss an episode. https://www.youtube.com/@holocaustandhumanity
Our thanks to the Mayerson Family Foundation and the VIA Institute on Character for their support of this series.
https://www.viacharacter.org
https://www.mayersonfoundation.org
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Find out more about what it means to be an upstander
