Lycée students in ninth and fifth grade built a replica of the Berlin Wall to commemorate the 30th anniversary of its fall this week.
German teacher Laurine Kleitz saw the anniversary as a rich learning opportunity for her ninth-grade students of German. She was looking for an engaging way to build language skills through a study of the cultural history of the period, which is also part of the ninth-grade history-geography curriculum.
The Berlin Wall went up seemingly overnight in 1961. Built by East Germany to stem the flow of East German citizens into West Germany, the wall separated families and friends, and became a symbol of the Cold War and the stalemate that had come to exist between East and West since the final days of WWII.
Students explored what life was like for East Germans and West Germans, and discovered the stories of the great lengths people went to escape to the West to reunite with their families and find freedom.
Over a period of several weeks, her students constructed a replica of the Berlin Wall in the center lobby. With the help of Brendan Cavalier, our project-based learning integrator, students worked in the Maker Space to build the wall. The work also engaged fifth graders in Harold Gretouce’s class. Together, the students built a wall from recycled cardboard boxes and covered it with period slogans and quotes, similar to those on the Berlin Wall itself.
On Friday morning, the two classes came together to tear down their wall in one cathartic push. They were joined by parents, teachers and staff, many reminiscing about that hopeful moment so many years ago.
Mrs. Shenderovich, whose twin sons are ninth-graders in Mrs. Kleitz’s class, described watching the wall come down on television as a student from her home in St. Petersburg. “For my generation it was the first moment to believe that something good might happen. It was the first moment that families decided they might actually leave,” she said. Her family did leave in 1998 settling in San Diego before moving to New York.
For ninth grader Esther, the project hit close to home with her own family members in Berlin. Her great aunt was separated from her great uncle when the wall went up in 1961. The couple went on to lead separate lives, marrying, raising families of their own in the East and the West. They were reunited for the first time in 1996.
Maud Dubreuil-Simons, assistant in Primary, remembers watching the wall come down at home with her mother in France. “That’s all we could talk about,” she said. “The oppression that went on for so long…We keep saying, let’s not let it happen again.”
Walls go up, and they do come down… Long may that continue.
About the Author :
Elisabeth King joined the Lycée team in November 2011 as the school’s first director of communications. A francophile at heart, Elisabeth spent her junior year of college in Paris, and held her first job at the French Trade Office here in New York. She brings to the Lycée over 15 years of experience in media and communications in non-profits, government, news and business. She was previously executive vice president and director of strategy at ABI, Inc., a boutique public relations agency, and she worked as associate editor on two books co-authored by Todd Brewster and the late ABC News anchor Peter Jennings.