EDUCATION

 
At the core of The Butterfly Project lies education and awareness. All butterfly events should include an age-appropriate educational component. For 4th grade and below, we recommend tolerance and anti-bullying resources found here. For 5th grade and above, we recommend Holocaust Education. This can be something as simple as using our biography cards and sample lesson plans to set the context. We encourage all participants to invite a Holocaust survivor to speak at the event whenever possible, or use a video to show a survivor’s testimony (see links below for resources). We recommend The Butterfly Project be paired with age-appropriate educational resources, such as:

• Bio cards from our butterfly kits
• K-12 lesson plans from our website
• Lesson plans from Facing History and Ourselves that integrate with our butterfly painting experience
• Inviting a survivor or one of their relatives to speak
• Visiting a local Holocaust museum or memorial
• Showing The Butterfly Project documentary film. Learn more here.
• Using survivors’ video and written testimonies from one of these resources:
  1. Echoes and Reflections (developed by the Anti-Defamation League, USC Shoah Foundation Institute and Yad Vashem).   Please contact your local ADL office for more information.
  2. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
  3. Yad Vashem
  4. Museum of Tolerance
  5. Anti-Defamation League (ADL)
  6. USC Shoah Foundation
  7. Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust
  8. Survivor Testimony from Bob Behr
• Other Holocaust-Related Educational Resources:
  1. Generations of the Shoah International
  2. Centropa – Website for Jewish History
  3. The Path to Nazi Genocide (Video)
  4. Confronting Propaganda Past and Present
  5. State of Deception Online Exhibition
  6. Redefining How We Teach Propaganda
  7. Propaganda Lesson Plans
  8. Mind Over Media
  9. Mind Over Media Curriculum
  10. Rescuers – the story of Non-Jewish people who put their lives at risk to save Jews during the Holocaust
  11. Holocaust Teaching Resources for Middle School Students (Butterflies in the Ghetto blog post)

It is important to ensure that all educational components are age appropriate. It is our practice that Holocaust education not begin until 5th grade. For children younger than that age, we use other materials to teach tolerance and acceptance without referencing the Holocaust specifically.

Click on the icons below to see sample lesson plans:

GRADE K-2
GRADE 3-4
GRADE 5-8
GRADE 9-12/ADULT