The Boy on the Wooden Box: How the Impossible became Possible…on Schindler’s List is the memoir of Leon Leyson, who was a child in the Holocaust rescued by Oskar Schindler.

From the description at Amazon: “This, the only memoir published by a former Schindler’s List child, perfectly captures the innocence of a small boy who goes through the unthinkable. Most notable is the lack of rancor, the lack of venom, and the abundance of dignity in Mr. Leyson’s telling. The Boy on the Wooden Box is a legacy of hope, a memoir unlike anything you’ve ever read.”

You can buy The Boy on the Wooden Box at Amazon.

Children in the Ghetto is an interactive website written for children. It portrays life during the Holocaust from the viewpoint of children who lived in the ghetto. At the same time, it attempts to make the complex experience of life in the ghetto as accessible as possible to today’s children.

Along with the description of the hardships of ghetto life, the website presents the courage, steadfastness, and creativity involved in the children’s lives. One of the most important messages to be learned is that despite the hardships, there were those who struggled to care for one another and to continue a cultural and spiritual life.

At the center of this site is an imaginary representation of a street in the ghetto. The site invites children to “move around the street” and “enter” various locations in it. In each of the locations, original exhibits such as video testimonies, photographs, paintings, and artifacts are accompanied by interactive activities.

You can find the following at the Children in the Ghetto website:

• The interactive street
• Additional information about the project
• Lesson plans

Note that you have to allow Flash Player in order for the street to work.

The Daughter We Had Always Wanted is the story of Marta, a young Jewish child who lived in Czortkow, Poland. At the age of eight, Marta was sent by her mother to live under an assumed identity with a non-Jewish family in Warsaw who risked their lives to protect her. After the Holocaust, Marta immigrated to Israel and began to rebuild her life despite various hardships. Today, Marta Goren is a great-grandmother who lives in Rehovot, Israel. In this age-appropriate memoir, Marta recalls her childhood experiences before, during, and after the Holocaust. Marta includes her address in the memoir and encourages kids to write to her. You can take advantage of this as an extension activity for this book.

This story opens the idea of children in hiding and the difficulties of living under an assumed identity. When the war ends, Marta finds it difficult to return to her old identity. For older kids, these pages could lead to an interesting discussion of their Jewish identity and how they feel about it.

Purchase The Daughter We Had Always Wanted from Yad Vashem.

Fragments is the story of three siblings sent on the Kindertransport to find safety in England, far from their parents. Author Naomi Shmuel wrote Fragments based on the experiences of her mother, the author and poet Karen Gershon. When read together as a class, this story introduces students to the Kindertransport and the difficulties faced by children having to leave their parents to find safety. 

Purchase Fragments from Yad Vashem.