How do schools worldwide treat the Holocaust as a subject? In which countries does the Holocaust form part of classroom teaching? Are representations of the Holocaust always accurate, balanced and unprejudiced in curricula and textbooks? This study, carried out by UNESCO and the Georg Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research, compares for the first time representations of the Holocaust in school textbooks and national curricula. Drawing on data which includes countries in which there exists no or little information about representations of the Holocaust, the study shows where the Holocaust is established in official guidelines, and contains a close textbook study, focusing on the comprehensiveness and accuracy of representations and historical narratives. The book highlights evolving practices worldwide and thus provides education stakeholders with comprehensive documentation about current trends in curricula directives and textbook representations of the Holocaust. It further formulates recommendations that will help policy-makers provide the educational means by which pupils may develop Holocaust literacy.

"International interest in Holocaust education has reached new heights in recent years. This historic event has long been central to cultures of remembrance in those countries where the genocide of the Jewish people occurred. But other parts of the world have now begun to recognize the history of the Holocaust as an effective means to teach about mass violence and to promote human rights and civic duty, testifying to the emergence of this pivotal historical event as a universal frame of reference. In this new, globalized context, how is the Holocaust represented and taught? How do teachers handle this excessively complex and emotionally loaded subject in fast-changing multicultural European societies still haunted by the crimes perpetrated by the Nazis and their collaborators? Why and how is it taught in other areas of the world that have only little if any connection with the history of the Jewish people? Holocaust Education in a Global Context will explore these questions."--page 10.

The ground-breaking report Teaching About the Holocaust in English Secondary Schools: An empirical study of national trends, perspectives and practice explores when, where, how and why the Holocaust is taught in state-maintained secondary schools in England.The challenges and issues identified have been used to design and develop the world's first research-informed programme of teacher professional development in Holocaust education. The landmark national research that underpins this report employed a two-phase mixed methodology. This comprised an online survey which was completed by more than 2,000 respondents and follow-up interviews with 68 teachers in 24 different schools throughout England. The report is the largest endeavour of its kind in the United Kingdom in both scope and scale. The authors hope it will be of considerable value to all those concerned with the advancement and understanding of Holocaust education both in the UK and internationally.

Teaching and learning about the Holocaust is central to school curriculums in many parts of the world. As a field for discourse and a body of practice, it is rich, multidimensional and innovative. But the history of the Holocaust is complex and challenging, and can render teaching it a complex and daunting area of work. Drawing on landmark research into teaching practices and students’ knowledge in English secondary schools, Holocaust Education: Contemporary challenges and controversies provides important knowledge about and insights into classroom teaching and learning. It sheds light on key challenges in Holocaust education, including the impact of misconceptions and misinformation, the dilemmas of using atrocity images in the classroom, and teaching in ethnically diverse environments. Overviews of the most significant debates in Holocaust education provide wider context for the classroom evidence, and contribute to a book that will act as a guide through some of the most vexed areas of Holocaust pedagogy for teachers, teacher educators, researchers and policymakers.

This volume represents the most comprehensive collection ever produced of empirical research on Holocaust education around the world. It comes at a critical time, as the world observes the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. We are now at a turning point, as the generations that witnessed and survived the Shoah are slowly passing on. Governments are charged with ensuring that this defining event of the 20th century takes its rightful place in the schooling and the historical consciousness of their peoples. The policies and practices of Holocaust education around the world are as diverse as the countries that grapple with its history and its meaning. Educators around the globe struggle to reconcile national histories and memories with the international realities of the Holocaust and its implications for the present. These efforts take place at a time when scholarship about the Holocaust itself has made great strides. In this book, these issues are framed by some of the leading voices in the field, including Elie Wiesel and Yehuda Bauer, and then explored by many distinguished scholars who represent a wide range of expertise. Holocaust education is of such significance, so rich in meaning, so powerful in content, and so diverse in practice that the need for extensive, high-quality empirical research is critical. Th is book provides exactly that.

Interest by American educators in the Holocaust has increased exponentially during the second half of the twentieth century. In 1960 the Holocaust was barely being addressed in American public schools. Yet by the 1990s several states had mandated the teaching of the event. Drawing upon a variety of sources including unpublished works and interviews, this study traces the rise of genocide education in America. The author demonstrates how the genesis of this movement can be attributed to a grassroots effort initiated by several teachers, who introduced the topic as a way to help their students navigate the moral and ethical ambiguity of the times.