The Holocaust, Human Rights, and Democratic Citizenship Education

Assessing the Impact of Holocaust Education on Adolescents’ Civic Values: Experimental Evidence from Arkansas

“…Education researchers and curriculum experts conjecture that studying the Holocaust imparts essential lessons of civic values, including justice, tolerance, and the importance of democratic liberties (Doering & Pekarik, 1996;Carrington & Short, 1997;Shiman & Fernekes, 1999;Russell, 2005;Lindquist, 2006). Russell (2005) argues that teaching about the Holocaust "helps students develop an awareness of the value of pluralism and encourages tolerance of diversity in a pluralistic society" (p. 93).…”

“…Descriptive longitudinal studies of Holocaust education find it to be associated with students' reduced racist perceptions of minority groups (Cowan & Maitles, 2005;2007) and positively associated with students' democratic and civic values (Carrington & Short, 1997;Starratt, Fredotovic, Goodletty, & Starratt, 2017). Others theorize that learning about the Holocaust can improve altruism (Tec, 1995), empathy (Jennings, 2010), and commitment (Shiman & Fernekes, 1999).…”

The Effect of Constructivist Instruction on Prospective Teachers’ Attitudes toward Human Rights Education

“…Regarding how to teach democracy and human rights, Tibbits (1996) and Kepenekçi-Karaman (2000) point out that knowledge of human rights can be taught in various interdisciplinary courses, such as history, civics, literature, religion, or ethics/moral education. However, several specific methods have been identified as most effective by scholars of human rights education; these include using active involvement and student-centered learning (Koschmann, Myers, Feltovich, & Barrows, 1993, cited in Shuttleworth, 2008Reardon, 1995;Shiman & Fernekes, 1999;Şahin-Yanpar, 2001;Watkins, Carnell, Lodge, Wagner, & Whalley, 2000, cited in Shuttleworth, 2008, lecturing to large groups (Burgess & Taylor, 2004, cited in Shuttleworth, 2008Mclntyre-Birkner & Birkner, 2004), utilizing student role-playing (e.g., Flowers & Shiman, 1997;Burgess & Taylor, 2004, cited in Shuttleworth, 2008, teaching and learning with case studies and daily life events (Sliwinski, 2005; United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization, 1993), using audio-visual materials (Praveen, 2007, cited in Shuttleworth, 2008, building teams for discussions (D'Andrea-O 'Brien, & Buono, 1996), and encouraging student community service to help the students to gain first-hand human rights experiences (Burridge, Hinett, Paliwala, & Varnava, 2002). Above all, Carter and Osler (2000) state that it is only through education, both experiential and cognitive, that human rights will be achieved and maintained.…”

Echoing with the voices of victims: Reflection on Vietnamese lessons on the Japanese experiences of atomic bombs

“…Short (2005) argues that such Holocaust education would not encourage students to connect what they have learnt with their own contexts and concludes that students would find such learning difficult and would therefore not be inclined to continue learning. Blum (2004) reveals the difficulty of turning the vision of human rights -the lessons to be learned from the Holocaust -into reality, despite Shiman and Fernekes's (1999) claim that human rights is the central message of Holocaust education.…”