To not want my daughter looking at image of concentration camps

[Coffeeessential]

My daughter has just started Yr 5, and is studying World War 2 this year. She was already having difficulty coping with the subject as she is so sensitive, but I saw nothing wrong with her being given the basic facts as long as there was not too much detail - She's only nine after all.
When she came home very quiet yesterday afternoon, she told me that the class had been looking at online images of 'Jews in concentration camps', and I am furious. While I understand that we cannot protect children from the world forever, surely nine is too young to even begin comprehending such terrible images?
I would appreciate other people's opinions, before I go crashing into the Headmaster's office!

We need to wake up, what these children are being taught may well save them from experience it for themselves,

My step mother, sister and parents fled Austria as the war started, they were the only survivors not only of their huge extended family, but of all the jewish families in the entire surrounding area they came from.

the truth is the human population of the world has multiplied over and over since then, and there are no signs of it slowing,

Which means our children will be experiencing in the none to distance future hideous atrocities, its inevitable,

one of the only ways we can minimise this is by making sure every last person/child has a total grasp on the implications of our choices,

How many people do you know that cannot be bothered to vote, all those who make that choice contribute to what happens next.

In 1994 the Rwandan Genocide happened,around about 1,000,000 (20% of the population) people were murdered, Hutu and Tutsi, neighbour on neighbour, family on family, genocide happens a lot.

Genocide is going to be a big part of the future, because we are in denial,

If we want a safe future for our children, we need to embrace every part of this important part of education, if we get it right, our great grandchildren may be the first generation to not to have this inevitability as a part of their future, we have to engage with the unpalatable.

Clearly we are inadequate at tackling population and so condemn our descendants to more misery.

Explain to your children, that the reason we share these great shameful sadness of extreme human behaviour towards each other is because we want something better for them.

Maybe a more sensitive approach to the atrocities of World War 2 for a group of year 5's would have been called for, but sadly these things did happen and to children much younger. It's distressing and horrific whatever age you are, but done correctly it is an important part of history and needs to be learnt. My mum was a History teacher and I have seen the D day beaches, walked through trenches, visited war graves and a town called Oradour Sur Glane (think spelt right) where the entire village was burnt to the ground and the population massacred during the war, all before I was 10. I remember it all vividly and am pleased my mum took me,it's something that will stay with me for ever and not be forgotten, which is how it should be.

just to give a comparison

On children in need night on the BBC, the do not show all their tapes and images all evening long. They save the most distressing for after the 9 pm watershed. Now obviously some younger kids stay up, but it really isn't unreasonable to say there is a time and a place.

They are distressing. I would be distressed now. If my kids never see them in school I would want them to see them at some point, because they need to know. But they need enough maturity to cope with and deal with the images they are shown.

My kids don't watch 12. 15 or 18 films, my oldest is 10. That is because there are age appropriate images.

It is taught in KS2, teachers take great care and have many guidelines and resources as too what is actually taught and what images are shown. You only have to look on this thread to see people have differing ideas as to what they want their child to see. Teachers will also take into account each year the children that are in their classes, before planning any topic as you will adjust it to the appropriateness of the children in front of you.

But, this is where parents come in, topics at school are starting points, if a parent wants to delve deeper they can. A lesson that sends children home distressed or having nightmares a not what any teacher aims for.

I think that yr5 would be too young to understand the politics and chain of events that led to the concentration camps. Therefore Im not sure there is much benefit in showing them images of the camps.

I remember doing Anne Franks diary in yr7 and think that this book is a good way to start introducing the subject to children before then building on that slowly at secondary school.

Im not especially sensitive but did a module on the holocaust in first year university. I found it really quite harrowing even at the grand old age of 19.

Learning about the Holocaust and viewing chosen images of concentration camps - absolutely fine.

'but I don't think asking them to search Google images for actual photos was necessary' -
Agree with that. At this age I don't think kids should be being encouraged to do random googling - DDs school always gave a list of specific sites to search for information. Just telling kids to google could turn up all sorts of inappropriate content, and its lazy teaching.

I was prepared to say YABU but thought I'd Google first to see what she'd have been exposed to. Having seen the images I don't think YABU. The teacher could have picked some appropriate images and used them on a projector or PowerPoint display.

It is very important that children learn about these things, but it has to be age appropriate. I went to the Holocaust Exhibition at the Imperial War Museum a couple of years ago with DH and my DC who were 15&13(very nearly 14). I cried, grow men were crying. It affected me for days, I couldn't get the images out of my head, I still can't.

It isn't mollycoddling to teach children these things on a gradual basis so as they become older they become more emotionally mature to deal with it.

It's not precious though! As mentioned up thread the children living it would be hugely traumatised and would need massive amounts of help to get over what they had seen and experienced. It's not some kind of ideal to live up to and not to be used as some sort of educational experience. What do you say to the child? "Well suck it up, they had to deal with it so quit whining?" Wouldn't any parent in any situation try to protect their children's innocence?

I don't know how you can teach about concentration camps without it being distressing.

In the nicest possible way, YABU. It is distressing at any age. I think it is important for even 9 year olds to learn about the world and the atrocities that happen. It does them no favours to be sheltered from it. I was a sensitive child and went to a Holocaust museum around that age. I was distraught but I learned a valuable lesson about what the world is really like.

Yes OP, these are upsetting and shocking images for a 9 year old to see and lots of 9 year olds would not be equipped to deal with them and the questions that arise from seeing such images.

On the other hand they are shocking images for anyone to look at and I don't think there is any real sense in trying to protect children from them completely. It is something hideous and awful that played a huge part in world history and I think that it's an important thing to teach our children about. The important thing now is to talk to your DD about it and help her deal with how she feels about it. We have a responsibility to educate our children on these kinds of issues for a number of reasons which other posters have mentioned.

As a point of reference, I was an extremely sensitive child and a worrier, but I read The Diary of a Young Girl aged 9 and was aware of a lot of what went on in concentration camps. I have visited 3 concentration camps, one as a 13 year old and the others aged 21...it affected me much much more at 21 because I was much more aware by that stage of my own emotions and of other peoples.

Yanbu

My 10 year olds would have nightmares.

They still know a lot about the Second World War.They also know about Syria but I wouldn't let them see pictures of that either.I took mine to the war museum in London and they weren't allowed up to the holocaust bit (sign up)for a reason.They still learnt loads though.

I'm surprised,don't think our school old have gone down that route in year 5.

quoteunquote
no-one is suggesting that it shouldn't be taught, quite the opposite, but that it should be taught in an age appropriate way.

ww2 is on the curriculum at secondary school and 12/13 is much more appropriate time to watch these videos than 9.

''children of this age were in the camps, so we should let our 9 year olds see the film''

every day 9 year olds are raped in the sex trade. Shall we show videos of that to our 9 year olds too? Because one lot of children have been exposed to horrific violence, doesn't mean we should expose our children to it.

cathpip
my kids have just been asked to collect family memories from WW1 for something for next years commemorations. My mum talked to the kids about her dad, including some pretty graphic stuff about his experiences, some of which was horrendous. They soaked it all up, and I hope it will colour their view of war, and that they never forget. But she wasn't showing them a video footage of someone holding down the leg of someone having their leg chopped off without anaesthetic. (which is what he had to do)

I think we forget how powerful visual images are

OT a bit but 'children are not allowed in Pompeii ' - we took DD when she was 10; the only bit that children weren't allowed in IIRC was one house with pornographic murals/mosaics (don't know, obv I didn't go in it either).

quote aren't they better being taught about politics from a young age then? I have issues about this in all honesty, IMO children should be taught about national political systems as soon as they're able to grasp the concept. From there they can learn about the historical consequences of political decisions, the rise of the Nazi Party in Germany for example. Showing them a snapshot of dead bodies being bulldozed into a hole teaches them very little without some understanding behind the decisions.

I think the point is actually about the curriculum. What was the learning objective in this session, and how does it fit into the children's study of History at Key Stage 2?

I teach Y5 and would never show graphic images like that to them. I don't think it's fair; they're too young to contextualise it properly (not that death camps can be rationalised) and it's unnecessary at that age. I think justifying it by saying they don't have to live it is a bit facile. Traumatising 9 year olds in one country doesn't help the suffering children elsewhere.

I think that's too young. Secondary school is more appropriate to see images of that sort. Many 9 year olds do not have the emotional maturity to process images of dead bodies and atrocities. All these comments about children living through it are pretty irrelevant really. Children live through civil wars in Africa and get their limbs chopped off and also get raped, does that mean those sort of images are ok for a young child here just because children there have lived through it. Learning about something as a child is one thing, being confronted with graphic images of suffering and death is another thing completely.

I am torn

I think children need to learn

and my DS is massivleysensutive, and I would hate to see him upset

Its hard, yanbu but I dont think "crashing" is required other

For me YANBU I wouldn't want my sensitive ten year old seeing the images either. FWIW dd's y5 class covered WW2 last year and the school was very careful of the content they were exposed to and so concentrated on evacuees and rationing tbh.

I think it's too young. I also remember reading Ann Frank in Y7, and nothing again until Y9 when they showed quite a harrowing video of the concentration camps.

Y5 is too young I think. A lot of children still don't have a proper concept of death at this age let alone understand the atrocities committed by humans too humans.

I think it is hard to explain the Anne Frank story et al without any concept of the concentration camps. Do you know they had been randomly googling or were the images presented by the teacher ?

Of course children should learn about the holocaust and genocide.

But the material needs to be age appropriate. My DD1 knows about the holocaust but I don't think she needs to be shown pictures at the age of 9.

And the person who took their six year old yo tge Imperial War Museum holocaust exhibition really they are too young to process that sort if information, to understand context - time and place. You just showed them a load of horrible pictures which made them feel scared.

The Anna Frank Trust does lots of good work in the area and their materials are age appropriate.

I know people always say it's important for DCs to know about these things, but knowing and seeing pictures is a different thing.

DD1 says she just held it together the first time Anne franks diary ended and then they rewound it (to get a date or something) and she burst into tears.

She was Y6 and one of our closet family friends is Jewish.

I think putting all the gory stuff in in Y5/6 when they do it again in senior school is just very lazy teaching. It's possible to do a really interesting and age appropriate unit I'm the Second World War without filling lessons with an franks diary and the boy in the stripped PJs.

Closest not closet