Great American Communicators: Patrick Henry

Great American Communicators: Patrick Henry

Patrick Henry was home schooled by his father and his uncle. He had ten brothers and sisters. He didn’t do well at farming or storekeeping, so he taught himself law. He became famous for a case known as “The Parson’s Cause” and went on to establish himself as a prominent lawyer in Williamsburg, Virginia.

Patrick married twice. His first wife, Sarah, went insane after childbirth and had to be confined to her home for several years until she died. Between both wives, he had 15 children, but not all of them survived childhood.

A powerful orator, Patrick Henry was always a staunch supporter of liberty and patriotism. His “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death” speech in March 1775 is credited with starting the American Revolution in Virginia.

He held the following public offices:  

• Delegate, Virginia House of Burgesses, 1765-1775
• Member, Virginia Committee of Correspondence, 1773
• Delegate, Continental Congress, 1774-1775
• Delegate, Virginia Convention, 1776
• Governor of Virginia, 1776-1779, 1784-1786
• Delegate, Virginia Constitution Ratification Convention, 1788

You can hear a historian recite Patrick Henry’s speech at this web site:
http://www.history.org/Almanack/people/bios/biohen.cfm#speech

 

Activities  

1. Carefully read the speech below. .
2. Choose at least five of the underlined words to look up and define.
3. Write one reason why Patrick Henry thinks the Americans should rise up and fight now rather than waiting.
4. Find an instance where he uses sarcasm to make a point and put a * by it.
5. Write a summary of the main points of this speech.
6. Recite the speech with passion.

"Give Me Liberty Or Give Me Death"

A speech delivered by Patrick Henry on March 23, 1775

 

No man thinks more highly than I do of the patriotism, as well as abilities, of the very worthy gentlemen who have just addressed the House. But different men often see the same subject in different lights; and, therefore, I hope it will not be thought disrespectful to those gentlemen if, entertaining as I do opinions of a character very opposite to theirs, I shall speak forth my sentiments freely and without reserve. This is no time for ceremony. The questing before the House is one of awful moment to this country. For my own part, I consider it as nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery; and in proportion to the magnitude of the subject ought to be the freedom of the debate. It is only in this way that we can hope to arrive at truth, and fulfill the great responsibility which we hold to God and our country. Should I keep back my opinions at such a time, through fear of giving offense, I should consider myself as guilty of treason towards my country, and of an act of disloyalty toward the Majesty of Heaven, which I revere above all earthly kings.

  Mr. President, it is natural to man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and listen to the song of that siren till she transforms us into beasts. Is this the part of wise men, engaged in a great and arduous struggle for liberty? Are we disposed to be of the number of those who, having eyes, see not, and, having ears, hear not, the things which so nearly concern their temporal salvation? For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know the whole truth; to know the worst, and to provide for it. I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided, and that is the lamp of experience. I know of no way of judging of the future but by the past. And judging by the past, I wish to know what there has been in the conduct of the British ministry for the last ten years to justify those hopes with which gentlemen have been pleased to solace themselves and the House. Is it that insidious smile with which our petition has been lately received? Trust it not, sir; it will prove a snare to your feet. Suffer not yourselves to be betrayed with a kiss. Ask yourselves how this gracious reception of our petition comports with those warlike preparations which cover our waters and darken our land. Are fleets and armies necessary to a work of love and reconciliation? Have we shown ourselves so unwilling to be reconciled that force must be called in to win back our love? Let us not deceive ourselves, sir. These are the implements of war and subjugation; the last arguments to which kings resort. I ask gentlemen, sir, what means this martial array, if its purpose be not to force us to submission? Can gentlemen assign any other possible motive for it? Has Great Britain any enemy, in this quarter of the world, to call for all this accumulation of navies and armies? No, sir, she has none. They are meant for us: they can be meant for no other. They are sent over to bind and rivet upon us those chains which the British ministry have been so long forging. And what have we to oppose to them? Shall we try argument? Sir, we have been trying that for the last ten years.

 

Have we anything new to offer upon the subject? Nothing. We have held the subject up in every light of which it is capable; but it has been all in vain. Shall we resort to entreaty and humble supplication? What terms shall we find which have not been already exhausted? Let us not, I beseech you, sir, deceive ourselves. Sir, we have done everything that could be done to avert the storm which is now coming on. We have petitioned; we have remonstrated; we have supplicated; we have prostrated ourselves before the throne, and have implored its interposition to arrest the tyrannical hands of the ministry and Parliament. Our petitions have been slighted; our remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult; our supplications have been disregarded; and we have been spurned, with contempt, from the foot of the throne! In vain, after these things, may we indulge the fond hope of peace and reconciliation. There is no longer any room for hope. If we wish to be free--if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending--if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained--we must fight! I repeat it, sir, we must fight! An appeal to arms and to the God of hosts is all that is left us!

  They tell us, sir, that we are weak; unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard shall be stationed in every house? Shall we gather strength but irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance by lying supinely on our backs and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot? Sir, we are not weak if we make a proper use of those means which the God of nature hath placed in our power. The millions of people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send against us. Besides, sir, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just God who presides over the destinies of nations, and who will raise up friends to fight our battles for us. The battle, sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides, sir, we have no election. If we were base enough to desire it, it is now too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat but in submission and slavery! Our chains are forged! Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston! The war is inevitable--and let it come! I repeat it, sir, let it come.

  It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, Peace, Peace--but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!

Great American Communicators: Sequoyah

Great American Communicators
Sequoyah: Inventor of the Cherokee Syllabary

Sequoyah, born in the 1770’s, was a Cherokee Indian. His mother was full blood Indian, and his father was probably at least half-white. His English name is Geroge Gist or Guess. Sequoyah became an excellent blacksmith and silversmith and operated a trading business. He also had a drinking problem, but he gave up alcohol when he saw how it was ruining his life.

Sequoyah wanted the Indian people to have a way to read “talking leaves” like the English speaking people did. He never spoke English, and he never understood how the English alphabet worked, although he had seen some books. Facing much opposition and taking 12 years away from his business, he invented the Cherokee syllabary. This is like an alphabet, but there is a character for each syllable, not for each individual phonetic sound. He had originally tried to do a character for each word, like in Chinese. Sequoyah used 85 characters in his syllabary.

In order to prove that his syllabary worked, he taught his daughter, Ah-yo-kah how to read. Word spread quickly of Sequoyah's invention. In 1821, the Cherokee Nation adopted Sequoyah's alphabet as their own. Within months thousands of Cherokee became literate. Thousands of Cherokee began to use Sequoyah's invention on a daily basis and the syllabary gave the nation the ability to create the first American Indian newspaper, The Cherokee Phoenix.

By 1825, the Bible and numerous religious hymns and pamphlets, educational materials and legal documents and books of every description were translated into the Cherokee language.

Read more about Sequoyah here: Sequoyah Birthplace Museum

"Sequoyah"
by David J. Brown (a Cherokee)


Thou Cadmus of thy race!
Thou giant of thy age!
In every heart a place,
In history a living page;
The juggernaut chariot time,
May crush as she doth give;
But a noble name like thine,
Shall ever with Kee-too-whah live.


Orion-like thou dost stand,
In any age and clime,
With intellect as grand,
As ever shown by time,
'Twas thy hand lit the spark
That heavenward flashed its ray
Revealing the shining mark
The straight and narrow way.


Ignorance and superstitious awe
From high pedestals toppled o'er
When as the ancient giver of law,
Smiting, thou mad'st the waters pour;
Stand thou didst on Pisgah's height,
And gazed into the future deep.
But day was ne'er unclasped from night
E'er thy spirit silently fell asleep.

Great American Communicators: Benjamin Franklin

This is another handout from my series on Great American Communicators that I taught to my students in the middle school English class in a large home school co-op.

Benjamin Franklin’s Contributions to Communications

• Benjamin Franklin was born in 1706, the 15th of the 20 Franklin children! There must have been a whole lot of communicating going on in his house when he was a kid!
• He stopped going to school when he was 10 (his parents couldn’t afford it) but he LOVED to read!
• He apprenticed as a printer -- but he hated working for his brother James and so he ran away.
• His pseudonym (false name) for writing letters to his brother’s paper was “Mrs. Silence Dogood”!
• At age 24 he started the Pennsylvania Gazette newspaper.
• He created the Poor Richard’s Almanack from 1732 to 1757. It was a yearly book with a calendar, list of events, advice, witty sayings, weather predictions, etc.
• He founded the first public library in Philadelphia.
• He established the postal system.
• He founded a college.
• He was elected to the Pennsylvania Assembly in 1751.
• He was sent to England several times to protest their treatment of the American colonies.
• He went as the ambassador to France to persuade them to support the colonies in the Revolutionary War.
• As a delegate to the Second Continental Congress, he helped write the Declaration of Independence.
• He was the only man to sign the Declaration of Independence, the Treaty of Paris AND the Constitution.
• He wrote essays against slavery.
• He tried to invent an easier alphabet, but it never caught on.
• He wrote an autobiography, The Life of Benjamin Franklin.
• I’m not even listing his scientific inventions – just the things that are about communications!

Can you unscramble these words and phrases that appear on this page? riptren, dusymepon, zegatet, clamkaan, clubip rilybar, lopast ystesm, bodarasams, easyss, tunconsittio, goubarthopyai, habalpet

Here are some of Benjamin Franklin's proverbs:  

• An empty bag cannot stand upright.
• Be always ashamed to catch thyself idle.
• The doors of wisdom are never shut.
• Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.
• God helps them that help themselves.
• Hunger never saw bad bread.
• If you'd have a servant that you like, serve your self.
• Keep thy shop and thy shop will keep thee.
• A lie stands on one leg, the truth on two.
• A man without a wife is but half a man.
• Nothing but money is sweeter than honey.
• One today is worth two tomorrows.
• Pay what you owe and you'll know what's your own.
• A quarrelsome man has no good neighbors.
• The rotten apple spoils his companion.
• Speak little, do much.
• Three may keep a secret, if two of them are dead.
• Up, sluggard, and waste not life; in the grave will be sleeping enough.
• Visits should be short, like a winter's day.
• Well done is better than well said.
• A good example is the best sermon.
• You may delay, but time will not.
• There are lazy minds as well as lazy bodies.
• Let thy child's first Lesson be obedience, and the second will be what thou wilt.
• Dost thou love life? Then do not squander time; for that's the stuff life is made of.
• A good conscience is a continual Christmas.
• God heals, and the doctor takes the fee.

What do these proverbs mean? Can you write some of them in your own words?

Put a star by the ones that talk about working hard and not being lazy.

P.S. Benjamin Franklin spent many years in Philadelphia, including a lot of time working in the building that is now known Independence Hall.  We visited historic Philadelphia this summer; you can see our pictures of the sites here: Historic Philadelphia.

Great American Communicators: Thomas Jefferson

In the middle school English class which I taught for a large home school co-op, I used to do a series on Great American Communicators the years we studied American literature.  I featured about a dozen men and women who had made significant contributions to American communications either by what they spoke or wrote themselves, or what they did to improve communication for others.  Some of them included John Winthrop (Puritan pastor), Jonathan Edwards (preacher in the Great Awakening), Benjamin Franklin (statesman, newspaperman, inventor, library and college founder, etc.), Noah Webster (creator of the American dictionary and spelling books), Alexander Graham Bell (inventor of the telephone and teacher of the deaf), Sequoyah (inventor of the Cherokee syllabary for written language), and Phillis Wheatley (slave poet).  Here is what I gave my students in their handouts for Thomas Jefferson.

Great American Communicators: Thomas Jefferson

President John F. Kennedy welcomed forty-nine Nobel Prize winners of the Western Hemisphere to the White House in 1962, saying, "I think this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered at the White House, with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone."

Thomas Jefferson was a VERY talented man. He was the primary author of the Declaration of Independence, second Governor of Virginia, second U.S. Vice President, third U.S. president, lawyer, inventor, architect, agriculturalist, archaeologist, and the founder of the University of Virginia. He also must have been quite a reader. After the Library of Congress was burned during the War of 1812, Thomas Jefferson sold Congress 6,487 books from his collection to start a new one.


However, for all of his intellectual gifts, Thomas Jefferson was not an evangelical Christian. He was probably a deist. He made up his own condensed version of the Gospels which left in the moral teachings of Jesus, but none of the miracles. So from an eternal perspective, he was not a wise man. 1 Corinthians 1:18-20 & 25 says:


"For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.” Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? . . . . For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men."


Oddly enough, Jefferson is said to have been a poor public speaker and gave only two public speeches as president. He even refused to give his State of the Union speeches in person, and instead sent them to Congress in writing. His other communication skills more than compensated for this lack. You don’t have to be good at everything to be good at something.


Thomas Jefferson died on July 4, 1826, the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. John Adams, who had been the 2nd president, died the same day.

Jefferson’s epitaph said:

HERE WAS BURIED THOMAS JEFFERSON

AUTHOR OF THE DECLARATION OF AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE

OF THE STATUTE OF VIRGINIA FOR RELIGIOUS FREEDOM

AND FATHER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA

He didn’t even mention that he had been President of the United States!

At the Jefferson Memorial in Washington, D.C., these words of Thomas Jefferson are inscribed: “I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man.”

Jefferson is also one of the four presidents (along with George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt) carved into Mount Rushmore. His portrait appears on the nickel and the rare $2 bill.

Can you find it on these pages?

□ Find the ellipsis in the Bible passage. Why is it there? (It is a kind of punctuation.)
□ Find an example of humor in the form of a compliment.
□ Who died the same day as Thomas Jefferson?

Think About It!


Thomas Jefferson worked with other men to write the Declaration of Independence. They each contributed their ideas, but he was the one to put it all together. What kind of skills does it take to get a group to agree on what to say?

Can you imagine being the person responsible for writing a document like this that would change world history? Thomas Jefferson’s words didn’t just affect the people right around him in his own time period. They affect us every day, because we live in this country, and they affect people all around the world because so many governments are based on ours.

You may not write anything as earth shattering as the Declaration of Independence, but your words – both written and spoken – do have an effect on people around you. Do you know what a ripple effect is? That’s when you have an effect on someone else, and then they in turn have an effect on someone else, and so on. So, if you take the time to encourage someone, they might treat someone else kinder, and then that person may pass the favor on to the next person, etc. But if you are nasty to someone, they might be nasty to everyone else around them, and so on.


My challenge to you is to stay faithful to Christ in all that you do, so that you won’t just be known for being smart or talented, but you will have an impact on others for eternity.


Read It Aloud!Preamble to The Declaration of Independence


I have included part of the Declaration of Independence below. Of course, they didn’t have TV or the Internet back then, so it was sent out by courier to all the colonies. Imagine, like nine year old Andrew Jackson (who later became president) that you have been chosen to read it to the townspeople. Recite it out loud as clearly as you can and think about what it says. See if you can memorize several lines of it.

In Congress, July 4, 1776


The Unanimous Declaration of the Thirteen United States of America


When, in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.


We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers form the consent of the governed. That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. --Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

(There is much more! This is just the start of it!)

P.S. Our family visited Jefferson's beautiful estate, Monticello, on our summer vacation.  You can see pictures here: Monticello.

Blessings,
Virginia Knowles
http://www.continuewellhomeschool.blogspot.com/

How Does a Home Schooler Change a Light Bulb?

HOW DOES A HOME SCHOOLER CHANGE A LIGHT BULB?


I don't remember where I saw this, but I tucked it into the June 2000 edition of the Hope Chest.  Wow, it's fun reading stuff after a whole decade!


Q: How does a home schooler change a light bulb?

A: First, mom checks three books on electricity out of the library, then the kids make models of light bulbs, read a biography of Thomas Edison and do a skit based on his life. Next, everyone studies the history of lighting methods, wrapping up with dipping their own candles. Next, everyone takes a trip to the store where they compare types of light bulbs as well as prices and figure out how much change they'll get if they buy two bulbs for $1.99 and pay with a five dollar bill. On the way home, a discussion develops over the history of money and also Abraham Lincoln, as his picture is on the five dollar bill. Finally, after building a homemade ladder out of branches dragged from the woods, the light bulb is installed. And there is light.

Holocaust Vocabulary and Concepts

Dear friends,


In my English class at our home school co-op, I have been teaching a series on the vocabulary and concepts of major world religions, including Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Atheism, and Judaism.  We covered Judaism last week, but didn't have time to discuss the Holocaust so I told them we will do it tomorrow (April 12).  This is actually providential timing, since Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day) is tomorrow.  Please note that this is not a full treatment of the Holocaust -- I am only introducing the terms and concepts.  I will bring along and introduce several books about the Holocaust -- some from the library and some that I own -- mainly focusing on fiction and biography.  I have included a short list of some of these after the vocabulary list.  I will also read a picture book, The Harmonica, by Tony Johnston.  I can never make it through this book without crying.  That is as it should be. This is such a crucial historical period to study, in hopes that we will never let this happen again.  Unfortunately, this past week marked the 16th anniversary of the beginning of 100 days of genocide in Rwanda, while the world stood by and did just about nothing...  Will we never learn?

Vocabulary of the Holocaust

The Jews and Persecution


• anti-Semitism: attitudes and actions against the Jewish people. Semite refers to the Jewish people being descended from Shem, the son of Noah


• Yiddish: language spoken by many Jews in Eastern Europe; a combination of German, Hebrew and dialects of the countries in which Jews were living.


• prejudice: an unfavorable opinion or feeling formed beforehand or without knowledge, thought, or reason


• scapegoat: a person or group made to bear the blame for others or to suffer in their place. The Jews were made scapegoats (falsely blamed) for all sorts of problems in Germany. The term originally comes from the Bible, in which a goat was let loose in the wilderness on Yom Kippur after the high priest symbolically laid the sins of the people on its head. Lev. 16:8,10,26.


• persecution: harassing or oppressive treatment, especially because of religion, race, or beliefs


• Diaspora: the scattering of communities of the Jews around the world, away from their homeland, Israel. From the Greek for “dispersion,” the term dates back to 556 B.C. when King Nebuchadnezzar exiled the Judeans to Babylonia and refers to the Jewish communities outside Israel.


• deportation: the expulsion of an undesired alien or other person from a state or region; Jews were deported from European cities to concentration camps


• displacement: the process, whether official or unofficial, of people being involuntarily moved from their homes because of war, government policies, or other societal actions, requiring them to find new places to live. Displacement is a recurring theme in the history of the Jewish people.


• Holocaust: The destruction of 6 millionJews by the Nazis and their followers in Europe between the years 1933-1945. Other individuals and groups were persecuted and suffered grievously during this period, but only the Jews were marked for complete and utter extinction. The term "Holocaust" - literally meaning "a completely burned sacrifice" - tends to suggest a sacrificial connotation to what occurred.


• Shoah: originally a Biblical term meaning widespread disaster, it is the modern Hebrew equivalent of the word Holocaust


• genocide: the deliberate and systematic destruction of a religious, racial, national, or cultural group


• pogrom: an organized and often officially encouraged massacre of or attack on Jews. The word is derived from two Russian words that mean "thunder."


• atrocity: appalling, cruel or monstrous condition or behavior


• annihilate: to reduce to utter ruin or nonexistence; Hitler's goal for the Jews was annihilation.


• ghetto: A section of a city where Jews were forced to live, usually with several families living in one house, separated from the rest of the city by walls or wire fences, and used primarily as a station for gathering Jews for deportation to concentration camps.


• the Resistance: the "underground" organizations working to help the Jews against Hitler/Nazi army


• White Rose Movement: A group of young German students who protested against the Nazi treatment of Jews and others. Most of the members of this group were eventually rounded up and executed.


• gypsies: a nomadic darker skinned ethnic group, whose ancestors were originally from India, which settled in Europe and was persecuted during the Holocaust along with the Jews.


Hitler and the Nazi Party


• Adolf Hitler: Führer und Reichskanzler (Leader and Reich Chancellor) of Germany who lived from 1889-1945. He committed suicide at the end of the war.


• Nazi: the political party, headed by Adolf Hitler, which seized political control of Germany in 1933; the German acronym for the National Socialist German Workers' party. People with similar aggressive racist views today are often called neo-Nazis.


• swastika: a bent cross symbol that the Nazis adopted as their official symbol; it was once an ancient symbol used to ward off evil spirits


• reich: German word for "empire." The Nazis hoped to establish a Greater German Reich that was “judenfrei” (“free of Jews”).


• Gestapo: acronym for Geheime Staatspolizei, meaning Secret State Police. Prior to the outbreak of war, the Gestapo used brutal methods to investigate and suppress resistance to Nazi rule within Germany.


• Aryan Race: a supposed "super race" of Northern Europeans. Hitler wanted to preserve the purity of good European blood by weeding out the undesirables. "Aryan" was originally applied to people who spoke any Indo-European language


• propaganda: information, ideas, or rumors deliberately spread widely to help or harm a person, group, movement, institution, nation, etc.


• Hitler Youth: (Hitler Jugend) established in the 1920's, it indoctrinated boys with Nazi propaganda, made them serve the war effort, and encouraged them to betray friends and family who were not loyal to the cause. The girls' organization was called Bund Deutcher Mädel. Hitler wrote in 1933: "My program for educating youth is hard. Weakness must be hammered away. In my castles of the Teutonic Order a youth will grow up before which the world will tremble. I want a brutal, domineering, fearless, cruel youth. Youth must be all that. It must bear pain. There must be nothing weak and gentle about it. The free, splendid beast of prey must once again flash from its eyes...That is how I will eradicate thousands of years of human domestication...That is how I will create the New Order." By 1936, all German youth were required to join it.


• Protocols of the Elders of Zion: a major piece of anti-Semitic propaganda, compiled at the turn of the century by members of the Russian Secret Police and later used by the Nazis to turn public opinion against the Jews. Translated into many languages, the book has been reprinted and is currently widely distributed by Neo-Nazis and others who are committed to the destruction of the State of Israel.


• Nuremberg Laws: two anti-Jewish statutes enacted September 1935 during the Nazi party's national convention in Nuremberg, taking away the Jews' civil rights. The first deprived German Jews of their citizenship rights. The second outlawed marriages of Jews and non-Jews, forbade Jews from employing German females of childbearing age, and prohibited Jews from displaying the German flag.


• Night and Fog decree: Secret order issued by Hitler on December 7, 1941, to seize "persons endangering German security," who were to vanish without a trace into night and fog.


• kristallnacht: (German) "Night of the Broken Glass" pogrom unleashed by the Nazis on November 9-10, 1938. Throughout Germany and Austria, synagogues and other Jewish institutions were burned, Jewish stores were destroyed, and their contents looted. At the same time, approximately 35,000 Jewish men were sent to concentration camps. The "excuse" for this action was the assassination of Ernst vom Rath in Paris by a Jewish teenager whose parents had been rounded up by the Nazis.


• blitzkrieg: "lightning war," used to describe the speed, efficiency and intensity of Germany's military attack against their opponents


• commandant: commanding officer of a military organization


The Concentration Camps


• Final Solution: The cover name for the plan to destroy the Jews of Europe - the "Final Solution of the Jewish Question." Beginning in December 1941, Jews were rounded up and sent to extermination camps in the East. The program was deceptively disguised as "resettlement in the East."


• concentration camp: a guarded compound for imprisonment of aliens, members of ethnic minorities, political opponents, etc., especially any of the thousands of labor camps established by the Nazis prior to and during World War II.


• extermination camp: a concentration camp especially used for killing Jews


• Auschwitz: Concentration and extermination camp in upper Silesia, Poland, 37 miles west of Krakow. Established in 1940 as a concentration camp, it became an extermination camp in early 1942. Some other main camps were Buchenwald, Dachau, Ravensbrück, and Treblinka.


• euthanasia: the original meaning of this term was an easy and painless death for the terminally ill. However, the Nazi euthanasia program took on quite a different meaning: the taking of eugenic measures to improve the quality of the German "race." This program culminated in enforced "mercy" deaths for the incurably insane, permanently disabled, deformed and "superfluous."


• gas chambers: large, sealed rooms (usually with shower nozzles) used for murdering prisoners of concentration camps with a poisonous gas called Zyklon B; many people were led into gas chambers with the belief they were going in to take a shower.


• crematorium: ovens built in concentration camps to burn and dispose of the large number of murdered bodies.


• death marches: At the end of WWII, when it became clear the German army was trapped between the Soviets to the east and the advancing Allied troops from the west, the Nazis, to thwart the liberation of camp inmates, forced them to march westward, resulting in the deaths of thousands.


After the War


• Zionism: a movement of people dedicated to establishing and preserving the modern nation of Israel as the Jewish homeland. Israel became a nation on May 8, 1948.


• Yizkor books: also known as memorial books, chronicle the lives of Jewish communities destroyed during the Holocaust. These rare books uniquely record the history of the shtetls (villages), cities, or regions of Europe, and are often one of the few remaining sources on a town’s people, as well as its cultural, religious, and social institutions.


• Yad Vashem: museum in Jerusalem dedicated to the memory of Holocaust victims. A tree lined avenue at Yad Vashem is commemorates "The Righteous of the Nations" -- those Gentiles (non-Jews) who risked their own lives to save Jews from the Nazis. The name of the Yad Vashem Museum is taken from an Old Testament passage in Isaiah: "I will build for them a name and a memorial." (Isaiah 56:5). There are many other Holocaust memorial museums around the world, including a large one in Washington, D.C.


• survivor: a person who continues to function or prosper in spite of opposition, hardship, or setbacks


• Holocaust Remembrance Day: also known by the Hebrew term Yom Hashoah, falls on the 27th day of the Hebrew month of Nisan. The Israeli parliament, the Knesset, chose this date because it falls between the date on which the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising began and Israel's Independence Day, and also because it occurs during the traditional Jewish period of mourning known as the Counting of the Omer.


• Nuremburg trials: a series of court trials conducted in 1945-1946 by the International Military Tribunal in the attempt to convict those accused of war crimes during the Holocaust. There were 24 men tried; of these, 12 were sentenced to death by hanging, 3 to life imprisonment, 4 to shorter prison terms, and 4 acquitted (declared not guilty).


For More Information


Web sites:


• www.ushmm.org/ (U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum)
• www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/holocaust/timeline.html
• www.remember.org/


Books (Fiction & Biography):


• The Hiding Place by Corrie TenBoom, or any biography of her
• The Harmonica by Tony Johnston -- picture book about a boy in a concentration camp
• The Butterfly by Patricia Polacco -- picture book
• Behind the Bedroom Wall by Laura E. Williams
• When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit by Judith Kerr
• Number the Stars by Lois Lowry
• The Diary of Anne Frank by Anne Frank
• Hiding to Survive: Stories of Jewish Children Rescued from the Holocaust by Maxine B. Rosenberg


Be sure to look at my Judaism Vocabulary list too!

Christian Biography Report Questions

Dear friends,

This spring in my English class at our home school co-op, I assigned for each of the students to read a full-length biography of someone who was a Christian missionary (such as Hudson Taylor, Gladys Aylward, William Carey or Mary Slessor), pastor (such as Charles Spurgeon), author (such as C.S. Lewis), hymn writer (such as Fanny Crosby), etc.  Most of these are from YWAM's Christian Heroes Then & Now series, which most of my students prefer, or the Heroes of the Faith series, which are more complete but not as kid-friendly.

The corresponding writing assignment is to summarize each chapter in at least one paragraph. As they proceed throughout the book, they are answering most of the following questions in their paragraphs, as appropriate for their subject.  Then they will compile their writing into a final report and oral presentation.


Questions for Christian Biography Reports

1. What is this person's name? Was it the same at birth as in adulthood?



2. Where and when was this person born, and under what kind of family circumstances?


3. Who were this person's parents and what were they like?


4. What was this person's childhood like?


5. What was this person's life like before he or she became a Christian?


6. What (and who) led to this person becoming a Christian?


7. Who were the mentors, coworkers, and close friends of this person? What quality of relationships did they have?


8. What were the main events of this person's life, including dates, places and other people?


9. What did this person look like as an adult? Did he or she have any physical handicaps?


10. Where did this person work? (What cities, countries, etc.)


11. What type of ministry and practical work did this person do (writing, preaching, medical, Bible translation, mercy, etc.)?


12. What was the impact of this work on his or her time period?


13. What was the focus of this person's public Christian message? Was there anything unusual or unorthodox?


14. What did this person think about the Bible, salvation, Christian growth, the Holy Spirit, baptism, music, and methods of ministry?


15. What were some notable quotes from this person? What circumstances surrounded each quote -- such as causes or reactions?


16. What personal weaknesses or temptations did this person face, how were these handled, and what kind of problems were caused?


17. What external opposition and dangers did this person face, and what was this person's response to it?


18. Who were this person's spouse(s) and children, what were they like? Was the family relationship strong or strained?


19. What organizations or trends were started based on this person's work?


20. What were the date, place, and circumstances of this person's death?


21. What is the lasting legacy of this person's work and witness?

~*~*~

Since many of them have been reading about foreign missionaries, I have also been giving them vocabulary and basic concepts for the major world religions and ideologies, such as Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, atheism/agnosticism, and Judaism. I will try to post some of this later.

Blessings,
Virginia Knowles