Introduction

The course Facing History and Ourselves will change you forever.  It will change the type of person you are and your perception of the world and everything that is going on in it.  It will change you morally and show you just how much one person can have an impact on the world.  You will learn a great deal about the Holocaust and Adolf Hitler along with many other things involving similar subjects.  It will also help you discover who you are as a person.  I chose to take this course because the Holocaust has been the most interesting topic to me in every history class I have taken.  I saw this course as a chance to learn more about the Holocaust and how it began, ended and everything in between.  I also had many people recommend the course to me saying that it is a course that not only with I enjoy but I will also learn a great deal from.

My name is Matthew Richard Demers.  I am an eighteen year old boy with one older brother and divorced parents.  My brother has been my biggest role model throughout my life.  He has led me to do many things including play six different sports throughout my life.  I have played Football, Hockey, and Lacrosse all four years of high school and also snowboard.  My parents divorce has led me to become a very independent person.  It caused me to grow up very fast and has also caused a very tense relationship with my mother.  I do not get along with her boyfriend and she is the only person I know that likes him.  He lives with us and has made many changes.  I have learned to live with him and this course has taught me to make the best of the situation I am in.

Reflective Essay

                The Facing History and Ourselves course has changed me in many ways.  It has opened my eyes to things in the world I did not know about before.  I learned that one person really can make a difference.  It also allowed me to put my life in perspective and how I view it.  I know I do not get along with my mother’s boyfriend but this course has allowed me move past that and make the best of what I have because I know I am very lucky to have the life I have.  It showed me that I need to take advantage of every opportunity life gives me.  I am doing so the first semester of college by going to Australia at the end of July for four months.  There was an option to not go and take courses somewhere else for the first semester and transfer in second semester.  My parents were strongly encouraging me to take that option but I saw the visit to Australia as a once and a life time opportunity and a chance to grow as a person.  This course helped me grow immensely and I hope to further that this summer and in college to become a more educated and mature person.  This course has shown me that I have a gift to give to the world and that I need to take advantage of this.  I have become incredibly more aware about my surroundings and have learned not to be judgmental.  I will never judge a book by its cover again.  During this course not only did I learn a great deal but I also enjoyed the course very much.  It was a class that I could come to and not worry about tests or quizzes.  I knew that it was visual learning and I would still learn a great deal but I could still relax during the class.  I am very glad I took this class and I would recommend it to everyone.

One this that we watched that affected me greatly was The Grey Zone.  At the end of the movie when it shows the Jews in the ovens putting the dead Jews in them there is a voice over saying “When we first start we inhale their ashes and cough, they get on our face and we wipe them away.  Soon we no longer cough and no longer wipe the ash from our face.”   This was a very meaningful moment of the film to me because it showed how the work the Jews were doing affected them.  The ashes no longer bothered them because they came so used to them.  They got used to the ashes on their face so much that they no longer noticed it.  Their lungs had adjusted to inhaling human ash and no longer being bothered by it.  They worked for so long doing the same thing over and over they were no longer humans.  They were machines working at the same steady pace, never stopping.  They became robots.  Another film that I thought was a very important part of the course was The Boy in the Striped Pajamas.  I thought this was important because the little boy was so curious and went exploring.  When he discovered the camp and the little boy in the camp he didn’t understand what the boy in the camp was in.  He thought it would be fun and wanted to join him on the other side of the fence.  This shows that even the son of and SS officer had no clue what was going on.  He didn’t view the Jewish boy as a Jew and the enemy.  He viewed him as a friend, which shows how many little kids were kept in the dark about what was going on because their parents didn’t agree with what was happening but would not do anything to stop it.  When the boy climbed under the fence to help the Jewish boy find his dad this showed how little the boy understood about what was going on.  The hardest part of the movie to watch was when they were being gassed.  They thought they were just getting a shower and they were holding hands because they were scared and did not want to lose each other.  Then it showed the lid open and you look into the face of the gasmask and the Zyklon B pours in.  My heart dropped into my stomach as I watched this.  I could not believe it happened because I thought the Jewish boy was going to climb under the fence and they were both going to live.  Instead the exact opposite happened and they both died.  The SS officer knew then when he realized his son had just been gassed to death that what they were doing was wrong.  It only became clear to him when it directly affected him.  He realized that as the gas chambers took his son away they were also talking thousands of other family members away from each other.  Among all these movies that showed the Jewish people getting brutally massacred my favorite movie was the Warsaw Uprising when the Jews fought back.  It showed that no matter how the odds are stacked against you and no matter how much you have been beaten down you can still fight back and make a statement.  The Germans were so shell shocked at how the Jews fought back.  What I enjoyed the most was how well the Jewish people worked together and how we got to see how they obtained all their weapons and supplies.  They biggest symbol in this movie I think was the Nazi’s table that he would sit at just outside the ghettos.  When this was destroyed I think it really hit home for the Nazi officer that the Jews meant business.  After this he used multiple cannons to turn the ghetto into a pile of rubble.  This was the saddest part of the movie for me because the Jews had nowhere to go and where completely cornered.  These three movies affected me the most.  I learn and unbelievable amount this semester by taking this class and I thank you for that.  I will take many life lessons with me as I finish this course.

Work Cited

Uprising. Google images. Online. 5/23/12

Warsaw Uprising. Google images. Online. 5/23/12

Striped Pajamas.google images. Online. 5/24/12

The Grey Zone.google images. Online. 5/24/12

Auschwitz.google images. Online. 5/24/12