Presentations, Lessons and Videos

CSA Presentations

Each year we invite experts – scholars, journalists, activists – to present to CSA participants, as well as veteran Centropa teachers who present their successful, classroom-tested lessons and projects. Below you will find PowerPoint slide decks and lessons presented during this year’s CSA.

Day 1. – July 8.

Introductory presentation to Centropa resources

Courageous People Project by Britanny Brown

Download presentation: Brittany_Brown_CSA2019

Day 3. – July 10.

Presentations of the “Marketplace of Ideas”

Museum of Victims’ Lives Before the Holocaust by Amy Leserman

Students often enter Holocaust studies with mistaken beliefs, e.g., that it is just a Jewish issue, that Jews
were somehow deserving of mass murder, that they threatened and were fundamentally different from
other people. This activity corrects these misbeliefs by using Centropa’s photograph database to
challenge students’ preconceptions about Jews through analysis of photographs of Jewish life before the
Holocaust alongside their own family photographs.

Download presentation: Amy Leserman – Museum of Victims’ Lives Before the Holocaust

Using Centropa in multiple ways by Siniša Vukadinovic

Centropa veteran teacher, Siniša Vukadinovic, shared a few of his most successful Centropa lessons, including one about migration that uses Centropa’s film, Return to Rivne; Holocaust lessons using Centropa’s film Three Promises and Holocaust sites in Belgrade; and a student exchange program with Berlin students that came out of his experience at the Centropa Summer Academy.

Download presentation: Sinisa’s Holocaust Lessons for CSA 2019

Telling Stories/How We Remember: The Diary of Anne Frank and Centropa’s Film, The Years Make Their Own by Magdalena Sajkova

Nowadays, with society moving ever faster and faster, it’s incredibly important for students to embrace
modern skills and abilities. Yet, in our rush, we mustn’t forget about the past, and we should instead look
towards it for inspiration. Using The Diary of Anne Frank and Centropa’s film, The Years Make Their Own,
(about a group of teenage Jewish partisans in Macedonia during WWII), these three lessons combine the
knowledge gained through history classes with the insight that literature gives us about life, along with
skills in software and film-making, to let students create their own perspectives on the past, present,
and future.

Download presentation:

Magdalena Lesson, Anne Frank & Yrs Make their Own

Magdalena, Film Transcript English Translation

Magdalena, Telling Stories – How we remember

Using Centropa films to teach poetry and language by Ettie Abraham

Centropa films are a great way to teach themes – love, survival, overcoming hardship, etc. – and
combining them with literature and poetry has a great impact on students. Ettie showed how she
uses Centropa films and poetry to create opportunities for students to explore important life themes, as
well as literary genres.

Download presentation:

Ettie Abraham – Herbert Lewin Presentation

Ettie Abraham – Love story powerpoint CSA

Creating a student film club by Khytt Lawrey

Khytt and her colleague created a film club for their 21st century, American inner-city, middle school students to
draw personal connections, cultural awareness, and social responsiveness not only to the Holocaust, but
also the everyday lives of Jewish people around the world. Students brainstormed, storyboarded, filmed,
edited, and presented all projects which were directly inspired by Centropa’s professional films, and vast
database of resources. The resulting outcome was students crossing boundaries through time, place, and identity to grow as global citizens.

Download presentation: [coming soon]

Elective videos

Teachers sign up to take the video elective because they are interested in learning how to make a video – and boy do they! In 7 days they have a crash course in narrative storytelling, filmography, audio, and editing. Working together, or sometimes individually, the below videos represent an extraordinary amount of work within the 7 days of the CSA – including evenings and free time – as well as the mentoring and help of our video coordinator Alex Treyger (United States), and Centropa’s own talented filmmaker, Wolfi Els.

Not as an Obligation

Created by Ferenc Szekeres

Family is first

Created by Magdalena Sajkova

Tolerance

Created by Jovana Pavlovic Azdejkovic

And He was a Child

Created by Julie Drake

Chai – The Meaning of Life

Created by Talli Dippold

Regina Jonas

Created by Gili Sherman

The Vilna Vegetarian

Created by Dayla Rogers