In the Classroom

 "Several times the teacher stood me in front of the whole school and tried to force me to say 'Heil Hitler.' One time, I was beaten unconscious, since I wouldn't do work to support the war. Finally I was expelled."

~ Simone Arnold-Liebster

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Not all persecution upon children occurred in concentration camps. Many children were persecuted in the same place they were to receive an education: school.

When the Nazis came to power in Germany in 1933, the non-German, non-Aryan population was looked at through scornful, prejudiced eyes. The aggressive, unfriendly attitudes directed towards adult "undesirables" were also aimed at their children. Thus, the believed propaganda against non-Aryans was brought into the classroom by teachers, administrators, and students alike. Jewish, Gypsy, Polish, Jehovah's Witnesses, and other targeted children were singled out and stood in front of the class for humiliation and ridicule, and sometimes physical attacks. Students were instructed in the degrading principles of racial biology, "proving" that Jews and Gypsies and other non-Germans were genetically inferior. Required reading in the Nazi schools was an anti-Semitic children's book entitled The Poisonous Mushroom (Der Giftpilz) by Ernst Hiemer. It's propagandist content outlined for German children why they should hate Jews and how to identify them.

Read excerpts from the book Here.                  Two Jewish boys being humiliated in their classroom.

                                                                               Writing on the blackboard reads: "The Jew is our greatest

                                                                               enemy! Beware of the Jew!"

                                                                               Source: The Pictorial History of the Holocaust, Edited by Yitzhak Arad, Macmillan Publishing Company, NY, 1990, p.37.

In their desire to replace Polish culture with Nazi idealism and to prevent a future generation of educated Poles, schools, libraries, and science institutions were either shut down or demolished. Heinrich Himmler wrote a memorandum in May of 1940 regarding Poles, expressing, "Teach them simple arithmetic, nothing above the number 500; writing one's name; and the doctrine that it is divine law to obey the Germans....I do not think that reading is desirable." To further this end, the Nazis also closed German schools where Polish was used to instruct students. (USHMM)

Jewish, Gypsy, and Polish children were ridiculed simply because they were Jewish, Romani, and Polish- by virtue of their birth. However, the Jehovah's Witnesses children, even of German descent, were persecuted for refusing to salute the Nazi flag and say "Heil Hitler", separating themselves from the Nazi Party, and thus were expelled form school. Simone Arnold-Liebster was one of these children. After expulsion, she was taken from her parents and sent to a Nazi reform school. Read Simone's Story.

In November of 1938, German Jewish children and Gypsy children were legally prohibited from attending German Schools. The attitude caused by this prohibition also prevented them from belonging to social clubs, organizations, recreational facilities, and playgrounds that were attended by Aryan children. (Children and the Holocaust) Eventually, many of these children were rounded up and taken with their families to ghettos, and then concentration camps.

For Further Reading:

Facing the Lion - by Simone Arnold-Liebster (Grades 6-12)

Return to Children of the Holocaust.