Official Site of The State of New Jersey
A Letter to Esther
Teaching about Sobibor can be a complex and heavy subject. The details of what happened there can be disturbing to middle school students, so to teach them about Esther, a survivor who made a life for herself after escaping, will give the students an understanding of the history while also making connections to the people that were affected.
Objectives
Esther Raab is one of the few Jews to survive the Sobibor death camp. Her story is remarkable and her work in Holocaust education is what drove her for the rest of her life. She spent decades ensuring there was justice for those who died and that students all over New Jersey would know about Sobibor. After learning Esther’s story, students will be able to:
- Understand the background and structure of the Sobibor death camp to deepen their understanding of the Holocaust.
- Engage in research about Esther Raab and her experiences during the war, by using tools like USHMM or other databases.
- Reflect on their understanding of Sobibor, the Holocaust and Esther’s story in letter format to Esther that should detail their thoughts.
- USHMM Encyclopedia on the Sobibor Uprising
- Esther Raab USC Shoah Testimony
- Esther Raab interview with clips from Escape from Sobibor
- Esther Raab, USHMM Encyclopedia “Esther Raab describes the uprising in Sobibor”
- Press Release from Stockton University about letters to Esther
- Irving and Esther Raab biographical information
- Excerpt from Tell the World by Shaindy Perl
- EdPuzzle for clips from Esther Raab testimony
- Sample letter to Esther from Kelly
- Sample letter to Esther from Kate
- Children Touched a Sacred Soul, newspaper article on Esther Raab
- Sobibor death camp and a Daring Escape newspaper article on Esther Raab
- Give students the background information on Sobibor from the USHMM Encyclopedia and show them the video of Esther talking about her escape.
- After the students read through Esther’s biographical information and watch the clips of her talking about Sobibor, it would benefit the students to complete an identity chart for Esther to help organize their thoughts about her.
- Before Esther died, she loved to receive letters from students and read what they thought of her play, Dear Esther. Though the play is not used during this activity, students can still write letters to Esther detailing their thoughts and feelings about what they’ve learned.
- Before they write their letters, allow the students time to review the newspaper articles, excerpts from Tell the World, sample letters and to complete the EdPuzzle of a clip from her testimony.
- The clip in the EdPuzzle is from a 3 hour testimony. In the full testimony, Esther details her early life, her experiences during the war, the war crime trials that she testified at and her work with school children in New Jersey. The EdPuzzle highlights the clips of Esther talking about the letters so students can understand how important they were to her. If the students want to see more from her testimony, the full video on YouTube is linked above.
- Students can write a letter to Esther expressing their thoughts and feelings about her story. It might be hard for students to identify their big feelings that come with learning about the Holocaust so to help guide them, they can complete this chart to organize their thoughts.