Thursday, May 24, 2012
Reflective Essay
The course Facing History and Ourselves
is certainly one of the most powerful and influential courses a
student could possibly experience. Spending only two quick quarters
in this class helped change myself into a better student in school
and other learning situations but also made me a more intelligent
person. One of the biggest lessons I learned from this course was
that a single person can always make a difference in anything they
believe isn’t correct. During this class we watched the film The
Grey Zone, which told the story
of Jewish citizens collected into a ghetto and constantly attacked
and beaten by the Nazi's. For a good amount of time, the task of
transporting the Jewish citizens into ghettos and completely
controlling them was going easy because no one was speaking up or
fighting for their freedom. But then that all change when a small
group of Jewish people began to realize that with enough support and
planning, they could attempt their very best to fight off the Nazi
power. After watching this film I have never been the kid to see
someone being bullied and just walk by and ignore it. Ill stand up
for the victim even if I dislike them or don’t even know them
because hopefully other people will realize its the right thing to do
and never be a bystander again. Another moral lesson I learned from
this class and its activities is to not make a judgment before
putting yourself in the persons situation. Nowadays people judge
people without having a clue what the person has gone through or what
their story is. One film that we watched that taught me to put myself
in another persons shoe's was The Choice.
In this short clip, a women with a young boy and a even younger
daughter are in line at one of the concentration camps where they
were being determined to go to work or to be sent to their deaths.
When the Nazi officer approached her he gave her the choice of giving
over one of her children and sending them off to a unknown place
alone or handing over both of them. The women refused to make the
decision due to the fact that she didn’t know what was to happen to
the child sent away. As the officer yelled at her to make the
decision she continued to refuse but then the officer demanded she
hand over both children and through a state of panic, she said take
the youngest child who was a girl. Watching this scene made me
thoroughly think about how unbelievably difficult it would be for a
mother to abandon one of her children in a completely unknown area.
To really understand the difficulty of the decision this mother made
I had to place myself in her situation and imagine having to give
over one of my children to strangers and I realized that it would be
nearly impossible. This lesson of looking farther then just what the
eyes can see and putting yourself in the persons situation as if you
were in it yourself is very important because it helps truly grasp
the feelings and thoughts that can be running through another persons
mind and help avoid one person from judging another person. One of
the earlier activities we did was read the story “The Bear that
wasn’t” . In this story a bear is found in a environment that
bears are not normally found in and no one believes him when he tells
them who he really is. They all tell him he isn’t who he says he is
and after the bear goes through higher authority after higher
authority telling him he isn’t who he believes he is, the bear
begins believing everyone else and that he doesn’t know who he
actually is. Then at the end of the story, the bear realizes that he
was right all along about who he really was and that he should never
let anyone tell him differently. This story taught me to never let
anyone tell me who I can and cant be. Ever since reading and thinking
about the lessons displayed in this story, I have stayed true to
myself and have not tried changing myself just because someone wants
me to or say that I cant be what I proclaim myself as. This is a
valuable lesson to learn because some people base their personalities
and characteristics off of what make other people happy and what will
help them fit in with society but never actually show or act their
true selves. Therefore if those people never get to express their
true selves they are also never going to be truly happy and only
because they feel like they need to make others happy before they can
make themselves happy. Those are only a few of the many different
activities that I experienced in this class and each and everyone
taught me a different lesson on how to become a better person not
only in school but also in my future when I am living my own life off
on my own. I feel better now that I have learned all of these new
life lessons because I am more prepared to deal with all different
kind of issues and situations with ease. I believe that I am now a
more outspoken and independent person who wont judge someone before I
have personally gotten to know the person and what kind of person
they are. I also believe that I have become more confident in myself
because instead of thinking up something real quick and giving it a
shot, I think more about my actions and decisions and how they can
affect myself and others around me. Facing History and Ourselves is
possibly one of the best courses a student can ever be offered
because not only do you learn factual content about the holocaust and
Nazi Germany, but also learn from hidden messages delivered in all
the films and stories read by the students to make them a better
person and prepare them for the outside world.
Introduction
Taking this Facing History and
ourselves course was easily one of the best decisions I have made in
a class selection in my high school class. This class teaches so many
life lessons to its students that no other classes could possibly
display. I decided to take this class while selecting electives last
year because the description said that we would learn in deep detail
all about the Nazi's and the Holocaust which seemed really
interesting to me. I also heard the class consisted of watching a lot
of interesting films which sounded fun to me. Before taking this
class, I believe that I wasn’t one of those people that changed
themselves to fit in with the popularities of society but I did tend
to occasionally go along with the crowd. One thing this class teaches
very well is that no matter how unimportant someone may feel in a
situation, everyone and anyone can make a difference if they stand up
for what they believe in. After experiencing this class, I have
learned that lesson and now feel like I can make a difference in
anything I feel needed by voicing my opinion and not just sitting by
and being a bystander. This class teaches many other lessons that
students would never be able to grasp in school and once they enter
the real world where they have to rely on themselves, would need
these lessons to get by successfully. I would also like to mention
that I believe that Mr. Gallagher is the best possible teacher for
this course because he really makes us students think thoroughly
about anything we read or watched and put ourselves in the
situations.
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