Sixth grade students who take German as a second foreign language studied contemporary German history as part of the interdisciplinary module titled “People Discover Various Ways to Express Cultural Values and Feelings.”

The teachers of German first presented their students with actual pieces from the Berlin Wall. Then, using photos and videos, the children researched significant events from the end of World War II, the construction of the Berlin Wall to its historic fall, and the reunification of Germany.  The students created presentations with which they recounted to their classmates events that marked the 20th century, such as the fall of the Wall, the reunification of Germany, and the end of the Cold War.

On the German Department’s bulletin board in our School, on a “wall” designed out of cardboard, the children drew graffiti centered on the following key words: freedom, democracy, united Berlin (Freiheit, Demokratie, es gibt nur ein Berlin). These words emerged as a result of the students’ research on the graffiti written across the actual Berlin Wall.  On the anniversary of the fall of the Wall, the students “tore down” the wall they had created and took a piece of it as a souvenir.