To have complained to school for showing Schindler's List to yr 9's

[jjazz]

Just that really. Dont know which parts they showed but DD was awake at 11.15 last night -upset as the scenes were still in her head. She is sensitive but not over emotional imo. she was 13 at end of August so is a 'young' year nine although the film is a 15 so none of the group would have been that age.

2rry but I don't agree that our children are lucky not to have witnessed or experienced the holocaust and that they should be grateful for that."

it is every childs right to lead a holocaust-free life, it shouldn't be seen as 'luck' ?

possibly that's what Mintyy meant. It's what i think anyway.

"however there are ways of learning about that that are more factual and less emotion-grabbing"

Yes.. but there are also (usually) less attention grabbing too.

It's one thing reading about the facts, and quite another to show the human cost. And I think it is the second one which is most important.

The other thing is, most of us will have had the opportunity to talk to people who lived through WWII, I remember my nan giving me her ration card to take into school and my grandad was a Bevin boy. Kids now are that much more removed from WWII, most of them will struggle to imagine a world pre-internet, let alone before that!

I don't think it's possible to teach about the holocaust without people finding it upsetting. Some events can be sugar coated a bit for younger children but this isn't one of them. It is also something that everyone should be aware of.

I remember going to the Eden Camp when I was about 13 and feeling physically sick when I went into the holocaust shed, my parents warned me it would be upsetting and even by then I knew about it just not in details.

A few years back there was an exhibition about it at Liverpool Cathedral and even as an adult it was upsetting.

There is nothing wrong with finding something like that upsetting, there is also nothing wrong with showing carefully selected clips of films to attempt to illustrate what these places were like.

My dh is now 48 and did a politics degree at York with his dissertation on the Third Reich. He is better educated on the Holocaust, German Fascism, WW2 and everything else to do with that horrific period than your average person. The only time I have ever seen him cry, apart from when we nearly lost our daughter at birth, was watching Schindler's List.

It is a deeply traumatising film.

Children should NOT have to feel grateful that they were not rl witnesses to the holocaust. It is their birthright not to be persecuted, tortured, imprisoned, executed. It is not something they should be grateful for.

Or what actually....and I hardly think comparing Romeo and Juliet to Schindlers List and the horrors of Nazi Germany is a fair comparison. If a 13 year old is mature enough to be affected by the film and go to her mother to discuss it I think that should be applauded. Being sensitive is not a negative thing.

I think the school should ask permission as it is a 15 and deals with very upsetting issues with the dramatic imagery to emphasise this. don't think the school are wrong to show it though. remember as a youngish child watching the World At War (the music still sends a shiver down my spine) and other movies and documentaries on the Holocaust which did really upset and haunt me but kids need to see it but at what age I'm not sure. My 10 yr old in yr 6 is watching The Boy In The Pink Pyjamas this year, don't really want him to see and be aware of this kind of stuff (protective mum) but it's important.

"It's every child's right"? I mean seriously?

It's every child's right to have food and clean water but that doesn't happen for every child in the world now.

So children born in the UK are not lucky to be born in to privilege where they have food,water,shelter unlike millions because it is their right ?!

Unbelievable.

In the funny old world of GhostShip my dh is immature and insensitive because he found Schindler's List upsetting.

I used to teach secondary history in the 1990s. At the time, the government sent a copy of Schindler's List to all secondary schools with instructions that it should be shown to all pupils. As Nazi Germany was taught in Year 9, this meant that it was shown in Year 9. I think it was a slightly modified version, but only slightly. And yes, I agree, it is deeply shocking and harrowing and now I'm a parent, I'm kind of horrified we showed it to 13 and 14 year olds.

No stop twisting my words.

I too found it upsetting. I didn't go crying to my mum saying I couldn't sleep though. That's the difference.

You can find it distressing, anyone with a brain would. But a mature person would process this.

When I was her age [feels old] our class watched parts of The Pianist, Schindler's List and Saving Private Ryan. Think we actually watched The Pianist and Schindler's List in their entirety. Can't really compare myself to OP's daughter too much as I've never met her, but even as a horribly sensitive teenager I was glad to have watched them.

It's all very well to have a teacher rabbiting on or reading from a text book, but those are fantastic films that really make you feel what it might have been like to have been run out of your home, watch your family die, struggle to survive. And these are films of survival. They show the extremes of human behaviour that stick in the mind and hopefully might prevent a level of apathy setting in around these events. This is the first generation of kids that probably won't have access to people who were there first hand, so I'm happy to give a bit of freedom to teachers (within reason) to try and keep some awareness of these events.

Yanbu. In any way. The curriculum
Is what it is but if the school had warned you then you could have decided how to support your dd through this learning experience. IMO her level of distress indicates maturity, emotional and otherwise - if she didn't understand it she wouldn't have been upset. I find it quite alarming that posters have suggested your dd is being immature for showing distress at the subject.
I'm 33. In scared to watch SL, saving private Ryan, Philadelphia and a whole list of other films. I was extremely, extremely upset by the boy in the striped pyjamas which I saw recently. When I was at school we read all quiet in the western front - I had nightmares for a long time about that.
I acknowledge that these themes are important for young people to learn about but I will not be shoving it down my dds throats at 13 and depending on their sensitivity at the time I would consider removing them from those lessons if I felt the need.

Ghost ship you have issues. What in earth is wrong with a 13 year old asking for support from their mother?

I'd say a 13 yr old watching this, being upset, not being able to sleep for thinking about it and wanting to speak to her mum about it is not immature at all.

I didn't say there was anything wrong with it. I said it shows the person isn't mature. Which is an obvious isn't it? No?

And feck off 'you have issues'.

And the OP didn't say her daughter came crying to her GHOSTSHIP just that she couldn't sleep because the scenes were playing over in her head. Oh yes very immature (in a deep sarcastic tone just in case you are too insensitive to have caught that)

Don't burst a blood vessel DONEINAGAIN

I don't think there's anything wrong with the OP's daughter being upset. I agree that it actually indicates emotional maturity.

Besides,one is never too old to have a cry to your mum.

I think as a parent, I would want to support the school here and support my child's learning by listening and talking about the issues raised, as opposed to going off at the school for doing what I think is very standard in year 9 history classes.

13!!!!! Ffs

Very mature

The only topics the government insists you teach in KS3 History are the Holocaust and the Cold War. We still have the slightly amended version of Schindler's List that was sent to schools in the 1990s (I saw it when I was in Year 9 at school myself), and we keep a video player just for that.

However, we don't show it until we do Nazi Germany at GCSE. You will never see a more silent classroom. We watch the Anne Frank programme that was on the BBC not long ago in Y9. The Holocaust is upsetting, and we don't hide that, but it is also studied in Y9 Drama and Religious Studies so the children generally get plenty of opportunity to explore the feelings that it brings up.

History is generally bloody - I've been looking at the Pendle Witches with 12 year olds, at Mary Tudor burning heretics etc, 14 year old boys dying in the trenches. It is only by remembering and understanding why things happen that we stand any chance of making sure that History doesn't repeat itself.

Think we can safely say op's dd is probably a tad more mature than a certain someone on this thread .

If the OP ever comes back then I think it more appropriate to discuss the reasons for showing the film rather than jumping straight o complaining.
Ghost ship I think some people process things internally and some externally through conversation with others - I don't think you can make assumptions about maturity from that.

Yes of course I'm terribly immature to dare to say a girl is immature for her age.