It was the 2006-2007 school year that I taught one of my greatest literary lessons. As a 5th grade teacher, I had the task of picking out class sets of books for the children to read. When I taught in Iowa, there was much freedom in planning and helping my students make text-to-self and text-to-world connections. Some of my favorite memories include reading The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and Bridge to Terabithia and taking my pupils on field trips to watch the movies in the theaters.
In our library that year, I stumbled across a modified version of Anne Frank’s The Diary of a Young Girl. It contained photos and plenty of excerpts and passages from her book. In my years of being in the classroom, I often saw that my scholars struggled with reading nonfiction. They were certainly capable; they were simply not interested. Thus, I set out to inspire them with this real story I knew most had heard about.
2 June 2017
My husband and I stood in line for an hour. We made friends with the people standing beside us; two young Latinos on a European adventure in front of us, and a Chinese-American family behind us. From the outside, the Anne Frank House and Museum stands five stories high and looks like a typical flat. I chatter away and glance at it on occasion, unsure of how I will react once inside.
We pay the fee at the entrance and immediately see the sign: No photography or video recordings of any kind. I quickly stuff my Nikon in my backpack and proceed.
I refer to the two years I taught at McKinley Elementary in Des Moines as the “honeymoon period” in my educational career. This next story is the icing on that cake. The 5th graders thoroughly enjoyed reading The Diary of a Young Girl, and participated in great class discussions and activities. Thanks to visiting a local Holocaust Remembrance event held at one of the synagogues, we dug even deeper into the issues of social injustice.
As I was researching on the internet one evening, I came across a newspaper article that mentioned a former World War II soldier that served in the Liberation Army would be in town. He was going to pick one school within the Des Moines Public School System to share his story. Interested parties need only apply. I quickly got to work and presented our case. This would be the capstone on our most recent literary lesson; history would come to life before our very eyes!
The whole day my husband and I spent in Amsterdam, the line for the Anne Frank museum extended outside, wrapped around the building and continued for a few more blocks. Once inside, it was completely quiet, save for the audio tour we listened to on headphones. We walked through slowly, taking every part in. Black and white familiar photos and quotes lined the walls. In each room, there was a video recording of those who knew Annelies best. Close friends, neighbors and a video recording of her father, Otto Frank, the only familial survivor of the Holocaust, at the very end.
About 3/4 of the way through the tour, the audio recording turned off completely, because we would walk behind the bookshelf to what was the Frank family’s (along with two other families) hiding place for two years. Up until that point, I had a mix of emotions: wonder, awe, heaviness, acute awareness. As soon as I took the steps up to the hiding place, everything in me went silent. The dark rooms with the wooden floors and scantily decorated walls proved too much to bear. My vision blurred as I began brushing tears off my cheeks. They would not stop falling…
The children were fully attentive while the WWII soldier that helped liberate a couple of the concentration camps told his story. “I’ll never forget that smell. It was the smell of burned flesh because so many people had been killed,” he shared through tearstained eyes. “It was pure evil, and I will never forget what I saw,” he said.
My pupils listened, eyes wide with understanding. They knew the evils he spoke of. They had read about them and seen photos. One by one, we shook hands with the hero, and thanked him for his service, and for coming to share his story with us. As he, his wife and son left our room, his wife leaned over and whispered, “We picked your class because we knew it would mean the most to you all.” It was a literary lesson none of us would ever forget.
As we made our way through the secret annex, I envisioned my three children living there, being forced to be quiet, and not allowed to go outside or use running water during the day, for fear of being caught. I thought of my husband, and what would have become of him, had he tried everything in his power to protect us and not been able to. My heart literally ached at the end of the story I already knew.
To conclude our journey, we sat in a room where Anne’s surviving friends, and current authors, diplomats and celebrities, thanked her in recorded messages. Hers was not ultimately a story of despair, but of triumph and hope. You left feeling, much like after you’ve read her book, like you knew her, like she was your friend, or daughter, or sister.
While my family and I vacationed overseas, there was another act of terror committed in London, the city we had just frequented one week prior. Loved ones messaged us (we were in Germany at the time) to make sure we were safe. We did not envision taking our children on an overseas trip at such young ages, but when the opportunity presented itself, we could not turn it down.
We had good, hard discussions with them about how the world contains much beauty and is meant to be explored. We were also honest about how there are people who do evil, and might want to hurt us because of the country we live in, our faith, or any other reason they might find. We want them, like us, to be cautious and aware at all times, but unafraid.
I am incredibly thankful for the opportunity we had to visit Anne Frank’s house. I am still processing and wrapping my mind around all that it means for me personally. Presently, I am greatly inspired and will continue to write, teach and travel when I can. And I think of Anne. She gave me the best text-to-self and text-to-world connections I could ever hope to have.
Beautiful story and thank you for sharing it with all of us.
Thank you so much, dear friend.
Giana, what poignant and powerful memories. I like how you cleverly weaved the past experience with your 5th-grade students and your visit to Anne Franks’ house. The back and forth between experiences were intricately and personally connected. Wonderful! Well done!
Thank you so much, Sonya! I appreciate your input more than you know!