home page
In My Pocket

Program aimed at school children

In My Pocket program participants will watch a video and read Oppenheim Sim’s true story about her escape, all alone, in 1939 from Germany.

By AJN STAFF April 30, 2023, 12:10 pm Edit
IN MY POCKET is a project aimed at primary school aged children.
German ambassador Markus Ederer (left) with Eli Rabinowitz at the Perth Hebrew Congregation.

The WE ARE HERE! Foundation in Perth has announced an educational project based on Dorrith Oppenheim Sim’s book In My Pocket to promote human rights and social justice through the principle of being an upstander.

Oppenheim Sim was on a Kindertransport to the UK from Germany in 1939, and was seven years old when she ended up in Scotland. She never saw her parents again.

She published her autobiographical children’s book in 1996. The beautifully illustrated book is aimed at nine to 11-year-olds, and affords a new perspective on the current situation of child refugees and displaced people.

It is also an introduction on how to be an upstander, and not a bystander.

The In My Pocket Project, the brainchild of South African-born filmmaker Eli Rabinowitz, who lives in Perth, has been further developed for WA Museum Boola Bardip and other organisations in Australia.

Program participants will watch a video and read Oppenheim Sim’s true story about her escape, all alone, in 1939 from Germany.

The program was developed with the help of the Glasgow Jewish Archive Centre, Edinburgh University and Germany’s Stadtmuseum, supported by the Western Australia Consul with funding from the German embassy in Canberra.

Today, there are millions of refugees and displaced people, many of whom are children. This project highlights their difficulties when leaving their country of origin and settling in a new country. They would experience language, identity and belonging issues, the changing of family roles and cultural differences. It provides a clear link to what young people from diverse backgrounds could see and face about their ethnicities.

This is a creative and interactive program that inspires children to be upstanders and not bystanders, providing them with the tools to build strengths to live in our multicultural communities.

The workshops are free for participants and educators.

For more information visit http://elirab.au/

read more:
comments