1. Hitler demanded that the nation produce a "violently active, dominating,
intrepid, brutal youth." What part did the schools play in carrying out that
The schools taught the students to live a military lifestyle. Everything was
very structured. Everything they did, they did mechanically. The games they
played as children were war type games. They exercised and marched and
2. Write a working definition of the word indoctrinate. How does it differ from
the word educate? How did Hitler indoctrinate young Germans? Why did
he focus his efforts on them rather than on their parents?
To indoctrinate is to "teach to accept a system of thought uncritically". To
educate is to "provide information, to inform". Indoctrinate differs from
educate because when you indoctrinate, you don't allow room for debate or
questioning, whereas when you educate you allow room for thinking and
exploration. Hitler indoctrinated young Germans by limiting their
knowledge of the past and of what was really going on in the present. There
was no room for different thought in Hitler's schools. Hitler concentrated
his efforts on children rather than adults because when people are young
they can be molded easily. As a person gets more life experience, their
mindset gets more concrete and inflexible.
3. Describe the messages a child would hear in Nazi Germany. How would
those messages affect the way he/she viewed the world? How does such an
atmosphere turn hatred into a habit?
Children in Germany were bombarded with the fact that Hitler was the
savior of Germany. Therefore, everything Hitler said had to be true, had to
be right. Both the hate and the superiority messages combined made
Germany magnificent and the rest of the world inferior. Children we
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