You can buy Irena Sendler and the Children of the Warsaw Ghetto here.
Citation:
Golman Rubin, S., & Farnsworth, B. (Illustrator). (2011). Irena Sendler and the Children of the Warsaw Ghetto. New York: Holiday House.
To Use or Not to Use:
This book is both devastatingly sad and supremely hopeful all at once. My students were so silent you could have heard a pin drop the whole way through except for the occasional murmur of astonishment. The discussion we had afterwards was incredibly rich!
Themes:
Social justice, racism, discrimination, World War II, genocide, human rights, non-violent resistance, resistance, doing what’s right, taking risks, civil disobedience
Type:
Picture Book biography
Grade Range:
4-7
Curricular Connections:
Curricular Competencies:
- Grades 4-6 – Social Studies
- Differentiate between short- and long-term causes, and intended and unintended consequences, of events, decisions, or developments (cause and consequence)
- Take stakeholders’ perspectives on issues, developments, or events by making inferences about their believes, values, and motivations (perspective)
- Make ethical judgements about events, decisions, or actions that consider the conditions of a particular time and place, and assess appropriate ways to respond (ethical judgement)
Content:
- Grade 6 Social Studies
- Regional and international conflict
- Grade 7 Social Studies
- Interactions and exchanges between civilizations and cultures, including peace, trade, expansion, and migration
Core Competencies:
- Social Responsibility
- Contributing to the community
- Solving problems in peaceful ways
- Valuing diversity
- Building relationships (ask students: would Irena have been able to save so many children on her own? Who did she work alongside to save the children?)
Summary:
Irena Sendler was a social worker in Poland when the Nazi’s invaded. She defied their rules and issued fake Polish citizenship papers to Jewish people so they could get financial aid. When the Nazis began building a wall around the ghetto and forbidding its inhabitants to leave, Irena and her friends disguised themselves as nurses, snuck in, and started smuggling Jewish children out of the ghetto. Irena hid children in trucks and bags or found secret exits via sewers or doors that straddled the ghetto line. Once the children were safely out of the ghetto, Irena and her team found safe houses for them where they could pretend to be a Polish child. One evening, Irena was arrested by the Gestapo. She was tortured for months but refused to tell them anything about what she and her team had been doing. After three months, she was sentenced to death. Luckily, the guard who had been charged with shooting her accepted a bribe from her team and let her go. Irena hid with a number of Jews at the Warsaw Zoo. By the time Poland was liberated, Irena and her team had saved over two thousand children.
Teaching Tips:
- Before reading, make sure that your students have some background knowledge about WWII. They should have an understanding of the anti-Semitic sentiment that was sweeping through Europe.
Other Notes:
- This book is heavy, probably one of the heaviest read-alouds I have done with my students this year. We took it slow and broke it up over two days as it is also quite text-heavy.
You can buy Irena Sendler and the Children of the Warsaw Ghetto here.
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