The Beast Within: An Interdisciplinary Unit

This unit involves a study of the darker side of human nature as explored by the literature and history of 20th century man. The following topics are covered in:

A series of discussion questions and activities designed as a study guide for use before, during, and after the visit to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum has been posted as a resource  as a resource for traditional or online courses. Many of the questions have been developed from data found in Michael Berenbaum's book The World Must Know: The History of the Holocaust As Told By the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. It is hoped that this page can be a resource to teachers and students visiting the US Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Mr. Cassutto has developed a series of pages on the experiences of his parents, who survived the Holocaust. We hope you will take a minute to review these pages. Their story may be an inspiration to us living in the present day, and the pages within this link might also be used to give the history of the Holocaust a personal side and a human face.

The Cassutto Memorial Pages were the subject of a lesson plan entitled "The History of the Holocaust Through A Personal Perspective." Many of the activities of the Beast Within are included in this lesson plan and have been expanded. The lesson was published by the Microsoft Corporation as part of its Encarta Lesson Plan Collection (no longer in existence).

English: Various pieces of literature that illustrate the darker side of man's free will. Topics include genocide, segregation, discrimination, hate crimes, and war as an instrument of evil. 9th grade classes may study works such as Lord of the Flies, (Thanks Hilve Firek for the suggestion. Be sure to check out her Holocaust Education page as well!) The Invisible Man, The Elephant Man, Night, Fahrenheit 451 and The Diary of Anne Frank as these works all illustrate the power of "the beast within" while shedding light on the good that can arise from situations created by evil. The following writing options will help the student make sense of the student's experience at the Holocaust Museum or when dealing with other Holocaust resources. Each deserves serious reflection, planning, and effort on the part of the student. Make it a piece of writing you can be proud of. Webmaster's note: Ms. Selby asks that you obtain her written permission via e-mail if you would like to use these questions as posted in your class. She encourages you to use them, but she would like to know that you are using her material as a resource. Please write to her if you care to reproduce these questions. 1) Select an artifact or photograph that had the greatest impact on you. List and describe everything you can think of about it relating to its hidden history. In other words, write a narrative telling your story as this artifact or photograph. Try to make this as authentic and historically accurate as you can understanding that your narrative will be a fictionalized account. This account will be in the first person. For example:" I am the cast-off shoe of Daniel..." (This should be a minimum of two double-spaced pages). 2) Write a narrative poem (1-2 pages, double spaced in length) which tells the story of one of the Holocaust survivors or victims. Use all the elements present in a narrative: plot, setting, viewpoint, theme. Rhyme is optional, but attention should be paid to imagery and figures of speech. 3) Write an explanatory essay, modelling the sample given for the traditional essay in your grammar textbook. Explore a theme inpired by this unit. Examples could include lessons learned from Holocaust ordeals, from Holocaust vistim and survivors' courage, the individual in conflict with society, how to combat Man's inhumanity to Man in everyday life, etc. Make sure each essay has a focused thesis at the end of its introductory paragraph and the structure suggested. Here is a list of discussion questions used by Ms. Selby in her execution of this unit.

Science:

 The Science teacher, Ms. Hurley plans to discuss the following elements:

• Genetics: Hitler's Eugenics program and the bioethics of genetic engineering and biotechnology.
• The inhumane nature and scientific fallacies of the medical experiments carried out in the camps by the Angel of Death, Joseph Mengele.
• The pseudo-science of racial classification and where racial studies have gone today.
• The study of genetic-related diseases such as Tay-Sachs, Sickle Cell Anemia, Huntington's Chorea, Down's Syndrome and other genetically transmitted diseases. In the area of biology, these diseases would represent "the beast within" the human body.
• Studying the social aspects of discrimination against those with these diseases during the period of Nazi Germany and in today's society might be an interesting approach to this biological component.

Mathematics:

Ms. Cross, our Math teacher, plans to have students examine the following elements:

Students will develop line, bar, circle or pictographs, illustrating some statistical application of Holocaust data. possible applications include

• Percentage of Jewish populations decimated by the Final Solution and percentages of populations remaining by county.
• Inmate populations of the major killing centers and concentrations camps during the chronology of the Holocaust.
• Percentage on non-Jewish victims by country at any one time.
• Statistics on the Nazi rise to power as seen in number of seats gained in the Reichstag from 1928 to 1932.
• Extent of German control of occupied territory by year in square miles and kilometers.
• Number of acquitted, sentenced and executed Nazi war criminals as a result of the Nuremburg Trials.
• Numerical comparisons between genocides of the Armenian, Cambodian, and Rwandan episodes and that of the Jewish Holocaust.
• A geopolitical analysis of the land distribution between ethnic groups in Bosnia as a result of pending peace talks.

• Write an essay or poem describing how you would have felt had you been a survivor of the Holocaust.
• Draw a sketch or other artistic expression describing what the Holocaust means to you.
• Include a written caption explaining the symbols of your artistic expression.
• Develop a short research paper that outlines where events such as the Holocaust are still taking place or have taken place in recent world history. Include a comment on the lesson of the Holocaust for current generations and world leaders.

Please read the poetry of 9th grade North High students who has visited the Holocaust Memorial Museum.

• Ashley B.
• Shannon S.
  Shannon has also posted a pencil sketch of hers expressing some emotions of the Holocaust.
• An Acrostic by April B.
• A Holocaust Personification by Eric Z.

• Christina J. has written a fictional account entitled In The Eyes of a Doll.

  Students who develop work that represents a high level of creativity and effort may have their work posted to this web site. Students from other schools who submit written comments, poetry, essays or who submit graphic art may also be asked if their work can be posted to this site. If you would like to have your work considered for web publication to this site, please indicate this in your georgecassutto@hotmail.com message.

  If you would like more information on the topics covered in this unit, please review any of the resources found within the link provided below. Since the Holocaust is the focus of this unit, the links below are the result of a webcrawler search using the term "the Holocaust."

  Here are some great Holocaust-related links. Be sure to check them out.

  We wish you could participate on-line in these units, but the team is no longer in existence. Still, feel free to send any and all ideas, comments, student contributions, Internet resources, and teacher lesson plans to the webmaster, George Cassutto.  I would be happy to post them as part of the collection of ideas for these units.

  Thanks!

To The Interdisciplinary Units Page