Paper Clips

By now, the story of the Paper Clip Project is well known to people studying World War II or the Holocaust, and the story really is quite touching. A tiny classroom in the small community of Whitwell in rural Tennessee gathers together to learn how the world went mad. In the course of their studies, the class comes to the realization that while the Holocaust ended the lives of six million people, the students have never seen six million of anything. In order to represent this seemingly abstract number, they decide to collect six million paper clips, to represent the victims of the most horrible deed in history. The class writes to celebrities and politicians all over the world, is covered by German reporters, and eventually have their paper clips immortalized in an authentic German rail car, one used during the Holocaust to transport prisoners to concentration camps. Every normal person who hears the story or watches the film about the project is moved, sometimes to tears, about how these students learned to overcome adversity, and how important it is to remember our past so that we may not be doomed to repeat it. However, in our Educational Psychology class, we could not simply leave it at that. We observed how this group of students worked as a classroom, the material covered, the appropriateness of the material, and whether or not this project achieved real academic and measurable progress in learning for these students.

First off, as observers of a classroom, I had to ask: Is this unit even appropriate for these students? The students participating in this project were in middle school, aged eleven to thirteen. This project involved graphic depictions, texts, and accounts from survivors that are gut-wrenchingly unbearable even for adults. Was it right for these teachers to go so far into depth with this material?

This subject was extremely sensitive for me. It is my personal belief that these kids were just at the right age to start learning about the nitty gritty of this material. If they were any younger, they would not understand the full implications of the horrors of the Holocaust. Several of the Paper Clips students were brought to tears during this project. To me, this is almost a wonderful thing. There is no way to dance around a topic like mass execution. A heavy emotional reaction tells me that the student really connects and understands the full extent of the issue. An emotionally healthy student in this age range will be upset, but for all the right reasons.

Secondly, did this class achieve documented improvement in these students' understanding of history? The educational philosopher E. L. Thorndike believed that numbers are the most useful tool for measuring how much a student learns in a class. Can we measure how much the students learned in the Paper Clips project by testing or statistics?

On a personal note, I will have to put forward that I do not care very much for Dr. Thorndike's ideas about education, but if I must answer this question according to his rules, I will. Did these students learn something that can be shown on paper? Of course they did! Should they have to document it by testing. According to this editorial source, no, they should not. The Holocaust was one of the most pivotal moments in world history, and because these students learned so much about it in such a positive way, perhaps their aptness and interest in world history will stay with them for the rest of their lives.

Paper Clips was a true alignment of stars. It was a wonderful classroom, with a wonderful project, with wonderful teachers, and wonderful students that learned some of the most important material a history class could ever cover. It was truly an unforgettable experience for the students involved and the faculty, and whether observing as a normal outside spectator or a prying and questioning education student, it is almost impossible to find a fault with this program. Because of this project, hopefully, these students will always want to go beyond the book with material learned in the classroom.