Approved Audiovisual Resources for the Classroom
SB 1828 assigns the THGAAC the task of approving audiovisual resources that can be used in the classroom. The following resources are approved. SB 1828 allows each Texas school district to decide which THGAAC-approved materials are age-appropriate for their students.
Educators should screen in advance anything shown to students to ensure appropriateness.
A Daughter's Life in the Shadow of the Holocaust, 2023. Anna Salton Eisen shares her journey to uncover her father’s hidden Holocaust past. Using her father’s artwork, original Nazi documents and photographs from her research and trips with her father back to Poland, Anna shares her detailed search. This 20-minute presentation is designed for middle and high school students; view here
A Lasting Image, directed by Kirstin Stevens Schmidt, Ana Villareal, Scott Huddleston, and Christine Veras, 2022; American short film features Texas survivor Dr. Zsuzsanna Ozsváth, whose memoir, When the Danube Ran Red, is also approved for classroom use; 3 minutes; view here
A Night at the Garden, directed by Marshall Curry, 2017. American documentary film; employs archival footage of 1939 American Nazi rally; 7 minutes; view here
Alma Rosé: A Tribute with the Ranana Symphonette Orchestra, 2016. Israeli television news story about Gustav Mahler’s niece, who served as Kapo for the women’s orchestra in Auschwitz, where she was killed; music teachers may find this of interest; 3 minutes; view here
Blessed is the Match, directed by Roberta Grossman, 2010. American documentary film; features the story of Hannah Senesh, who was part of a small team of Jews that parachuted into Yugoslavia on a mission to save Hungary’s endangered Jews; she was captured and executed, but her poems are widely read; 86 minutes; view here
European Antisemitism from Its Origins to the Holocaust, USHMM, 2021. American documentary film; presents an overview of the growth of hatred and persecution of the Jewish people; 14 minutes; view here
No Place on Earth, directed by Janet Tobias, 2013. American documentary film; survivors who hid in the world’s second-largest underground cavernous formation during the Holocaust return decades later to tell their story; the picture book, The Secret of Priest’s Grotto: A Holocaust Survival Story, tells of the same family; 83 minutes; view here
One Survivor Remembers, directed by Kary Antholis, 1995. American documentary film; features interviews with Gerda Weissmann Klein, who survived concentration camps and a death march that are also described in the memoir, All But My Life; 40 minutes; opening images depict emaciated corpses; appropriate for upper middle school; entire film may be found here
Rescue and Return, 2024. Video by filmmakers Anna Salton Eisen and Aaron Eisen of Texas, describing the fascinating activities of two individuals: Irena Sendler, who rescued Jewish children during the Holocaust, and Anna’s own mother, a Holocaust survivor who aided orphaned Jewish child survivors during the postwar period. 20 minutes; view here
The Art of Ghetto Survivor, Samuel Bak (from the Pucker Gallery)
The Courage to Care, directed by Robert Gardner, 1985. American documentary film; features interviews with rescuers and rescued; 29 minutes; view here
The Miracle of Shanghai, posted by Shanghai Daily. Short video describing how Shanghai, China, provided refuge to thousands of Jews who fled the Holocaust; 5 minutes (Note: Some of those Jews eventually settled in Texas.) view here
The Path to Nazi Genocide, USHMM, 2014. American documentary film; features the rise of Nazism and Hitler, as well as its impact on Jews; 39 minutes; view here
Approved Songs
"Cable Street." The Young'Uns, 2017. This song describes the Battle of Cable Street in London between anti-fascists and police officers protecting the British Union of Fascists in 1936; lyrics here
"Hi" ["Chai"]. Ofra Haza, 1983. This performance in Munich was first runner-up at Eurovision, where it was the Israeli entry. Decades after the Holocaust and several years after the Olympics massacre in the same city, Haza's dancers boldly wore yellow as she sang about the survival of the Jewish people; Hebrew and English lyrics here
"Red Sector A". Rush, 1984. This song about the camps is based on the experiences of singer Geddy Lee's mother, a survivor. Lee has spoken about the Holocaust in many interviews that can be found online; Lyrics here
"You Want It Darker." Leonard Cohen, 2016. Cohen's Grammy-winning song from his final album reflects his thoughts on the Holocaust; Lyrics here
"Zog nit keyn mol" ["Don't Ever Say"/Jewish Partisans Song]. Chava Alberstein, written in 1943. Inspired by news of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, Jewish partisan groups adopted this song as an unofficial anthem for their cause; Yiddish and English lyrics here
Audiovisual resources on the THGAAC Antisemitism page and the THGAAC Texas Connections page are also approved for classroom use during Holocaust Remembrance Week.