Teaching the holocaust through digital heritage, experiential and project-based learning: Finding Matilda- A documentary by students, about a student, for students

Abstract

Recent research has reported that two-thirds of American Generation Z has vague knowledge of the genocide of World War II.  Twenty-two percent of millennials said that they have never heard of the Holocaust or were just not sure. Armed with this knowledge we set out to create a project, a documentary, to help students better understand this horrifying part of our history on terms that they can identify with. This documentary is about a young college student in the midst of war.  By creating a documentary by college students, about a college student, for college students I set out to teach the Holocaust.  Through digital heritage, experiential and project-based learning; we created a project to help Gen Z better understand history.   We are using these approaches to give an understanding of the Holocaust through our journey to Finding Matilda.   Key words: Digital media, teaching, experiential learning, project-based learning.