School Sparks: Sharing Opposite Sides of a Painful History

By Joanne Baker, 7th & 8th Grade English Teacher, Rosh 8th Grade

In commemoration of International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the following words were quietly spoken by the Head of the German International School of Boston to our 7th and 8th graders sitting side by side with their German peers.

“Eighty years ago, it would have been impossible that students from a German school and a Jewish school could work together. Now, eighty years after the Holocaust, we want to be grateful that we can be together and we want to focus on a peaceful future for the Jewish and German communities…”

JCDS has had a powerful relationship with the German International School of Boston for eight years, thanks to 5th-6th Grade Tanakh Teacher and Tzufit Advisor, Andrea Silton, who recognized a moral imperative – that our students should interact with peers who share opposite sides of a painful history – and with whom they share, and bear, the responsibility of remembering. To this day, their work continues.

At our recent visit to the German International School, small groups of mixed middle school students were given a large blank puzzle piece on which they were to both draw and write a verse in English, German, and Hebrew in response to three connected prompts:

• What brings us together today?
• What is our responsibility to the history that we share?
• What do we learn from our shared history that we can take into a peaceful future?

The JCDS and GIS students worked seamlessly together, and upon completion of this giant jigsaw, gathered in a large circle, where in the middle each group explained their particular piece, and the puzzle was put together. We then sang Eli Eli, a hauntingly beautiful Holocaust remembrance song which the German middle schoolers learned to sing in unison with us, their Jewish friends, and our beautiful visit came to an end.

Within this effort to build bonds and bring our children together in collective understanding, equally powerful was the laughter and joy among these peers who, even in the shadow of our horrific history, are still kids and fully enjoy one another simply for being who they are.