Joe Venditti's Blog: January 2011

My name is Joe Venditti, I am a quiet but hardworking student. I was new to the school last year as a junior, one may think it would be a tough transition to a new school as a junior but luckily I've played hockey with a lot of the Westborough hockey players before and Westborough is a very welcoming environment in general so I ended up fitting in just fine. I really did not know what I was doing when we given our course selection packets. Last year when I chose Facing History & Ourselves, I thought the class was just going to be a regular blow off class and I had no idea who Mr. Gallagher was. I was very wrong. Facing History ended up being my favorite class and Mr. Gallagher my favorite teacher. I learned a lot of things in this class and I'm really glad I chose it. This class was about obtaining the intellectual and emotional connection with the topics we are learning about that Mr. Gallagher has, and using our newly gained knowledge to become better people and realize that we can never let something like the Holocaust ever happen again. I am the oldest of five children and I have two younger brothers currently attending Westborough High School. I am highly recommending this class to both of them and I will do the same for my two sisters when they go to the school in a few years. I want them all to take the class no matter who is teaching it but hopefully at least a few of my siblings get to take the class with Mr. Gallagher.

Facing History and Ourselves should be a required course for all high school students. It consists of the most important topics to all of American culture, specifically, the Holocaust. There were lessons that showed World War II clips that had not been seen by anyone in the class. We watched movies that were as historically accurate as possible in order to show a younger generation some of the things our country has been through. I believe, the more our class “learned” about the Holocaust, the more the class realized we really knew nothing of the horrors the Jewish people actually went through. The class was well designed in that the lessons were done with many different styles of teaching in mind. We watched movies and documentaries, we read articles, and we had group discussions. This made it much easier to absorb as much information as I did. On top of that, having a teacher who is so passionate about the class makes it much more memorable as well. Facing History and Ourselves would be a very different class without Mr. Gallagher, having said that, I still think the class is a necessary component for high school education. I think that some of the movies stuck with me the most because I am more of a visual learner. Movies like Uprising, The Grey Zone, and the Boy in Striped Pajamas really got to me, and made me realize how horrible the holocaust really was, and that I will never really understand it because I was not there. Some things are too terrible to even begin to comprehend.

The Uprising was a really interesting movie because I was not aware that the Jews held captive in Warsaw actually fought back. They made a valiant effort to fight back against the Nazi's. They lasted almost a month, which is much longer than I ever would have imagined. Another movie that fascinated me was the Grey Zone. The Grey Zone is about the true story of Dr. Miklos Nyiszli, a Hungarian Jew chosen by Josef Mengele to be the head pathologist at Auschwitz. These Jews were about to start the only known rebellion at Auschwitz but the plan was put on hold when they discover a young girl who had survived the gassing. This was another cool movie because once again, I was not aware of any rebellions made by the Jews during the Holocaust, so it was very interesting and it also offered a realistic glimpse into the Auschwitz concentration camp. The Boy in Striped Pajamas was historical fiction but it was a terrifying story just the same. It was until an SS officer killed his own son, that he realized how horrific the Nazi crimes against the Jews really were. The last video we watched was probably the most powerful. It didn't tell any heroic stories and it was all historical fact. It went through all of the different death camps and showed the aftermath. There were corpses everywhere, and nothing was censored I think because the film wanted to show how appalling the Holocaust really was. As well as all of these movies portrayed the Holocaust, I think Mr. Gallagher really wanted us to realize that we will never understand the Holocaust completely. Even he said that coming into the course he thought he knew a lot about the Holocaust, but after beginning to teach it, he realized he really knew nothing because he was not there.

Facing History & Ourselves was more than just a history class though. I feel that a majority of the students in our class, including myself, have become stronger people in general. We have become more individualistic, respectful, and have even talked about how harmful things like bullying can be to other people. We learned not to be by-standers. These are the reasons why I can honestly say that I have learned more valuable things in Facing History than I have in any of my other classes. Some of the things I learn in school, I feel as though I may never have to use again, but in Facing History we learn life long lessons everyday. On our virtual last day of class, the Principal came into out class and asked us what we thought of the class. It was a unanimous decision that every single high school student should have to take this class. Unfortunately, we know Mr. Gallagher will not be able to teach the class forever and the class will be very different without him. But I believe if we find someone as passionate as him, the class will be able to continue, so it is very important that we do so soon.

Joe Venditti's Blog

Monday, January 17, 2011

Introduction

What Facing History and Ourselves Meant to Me

Works Cited