Mural Lesson Plan

1. Warm Up (10 mins)

Using a projector, smartboard, or printed materials, begin the lesson with a class discussion using the Student Handout: Mural Images and Site Photos. First, explain to your students that you are going to be exploring a mural at a Holocaust memorial park and discuss the following questions:

• What do you see in the artwork?
• What do you think this mural is about?
• What else exists at the Holocaust Memorial Plaza?

Introduce the mural map and explain to your students that the mural is made of public contributions of childhood memories – such as prayers, songs, poems, and lullabies- from people who live in the Philadelphia region. Click on a few mural panels to show your students some of the quotes on the mural and then discuss the following questions: 

• Why do you think there are so many languages displayed on this mural?
• What are some languages that you recognize?

2. Historical Context

Read the following section as a whole class. To distribute student copy, see Student Handout: Historical Context in the side bar. A glossary of terms can be found in the side bar as well.

Antisemitism had existed in Europe long before Hitler’s rise to power in Germany in 1933. Throughout the late 1800s and early 1920s, there were waves of mass emigration of Jews fleeing antisemitic legislation and violence in Europe. Approximately 2 to 3 million Jews, primarily from Eastern Europe immigrated to the U.S. between 1881 and 1924, fleeing pogroms and other forms of persecution. 

In the early 1930s there were roughly 523,000 Jews in Germany, representing less than 1% of the population. The majority of the German Jewish community were assimilated and most lived in cities, with the highest Jewish population residing in Berlin. When the Nazis came to power in 1933, fears of antisemitic legislation and violence resulted in over 37,000 Jews immediately fleeing Germany to neighboring counties, such as France, Belgium, Denmark, Switzerland, and the Netherlands. However, strict immigration restrictions made it increasingly challenging for immigrants to get to places like the U.S. and Great Britain.  

As the 1930s wore on, Jewish people found life increasingly difficult. In 1935, the Nuremberg Race Laws stripped Jewish people of citizenship and narrowed the definition of a German citizen to Aryans, excluding Jewish people, Roma, and Black people from German society. In 1938 and 1939 there was a rise in migration, brought on first by Germany’s annexation of Austria in March, and then the  Kristallnacht pogrom in November. Kristallnacht was a nationwide night of pogrom targeting Jewish synagogues, businesses, homes, and people.  

As the Nazi threat widened in Europe it had caused an immense refugee crisis. Jewish people and others targeted by the Nazi regime, including political and intellectual opponents, were all at risk of persecution, violence and death. U.S. President Roosevelt brought together leaders from 32 countries in Evian, France to discuss the crisis. Delegates from the U.S., Great Britain, France, Canada and Australia discussed the ongoing crisis, however with little interest in taking in more refugees, the Evian Conference ended without any real solution. 

With the start of WWII in 1939, Germany began to expand its territorial holdings in Europe, further propelling the refugee crises in Western and Central Europe. In total, between 180,000 and 220,000 European refugees immigrated to the United States during the Holocaust (1933-1945) with the overwhelming majority arriving before 1942. Many more people tried to escape from Nazi occupied Europe, but ultimately became victims of the Holocaust and atrocities of WWII. 

In 1933, approximately 9.5 million Jews lived in Europe but by the end of WWII, two-third of Europe’s Jewish population perished.  

When WWII ended in 1945, roughly 11 million people remained uprooted and displaced throughout Europe. This included people who had been forced laborers, Jewish and non-Jewish survivors of concentration camps, former prisoners-of-war (POWs), and people who had fled to western Europe to escape the USSR.  Many displaced people did not or could not return to their homes across Europe as their communities had been decimated and their possessions had been taken by the Nazi regime and the members of the public. Rampant antisemitism still existed throughout Europe and there were violent pogroms against Jewish people who attempted to return home. As a temporary solution, Displaced Persons’ Camps (DP Camps) were set up in Germany, Austria, and Italy to hold the roughly 250,000 Jewish DPs. As this was meant to be temporary, the Allied powers had to quickly figure out how to support this massive number of people seeking new homes and safety. Some DPs found their way to other countries soon after the Holocaust, relying on family members who lived in places like the United States and Canada.  The U.S.Congress passed the Displaced Persons Act of 1948, providing approximately 400,000 US immigration visas for displaced persons between 1949 and 1952.  

By 1952 there were over 80,000 Jewish DPs in the United States, about 136,000 in Israel, and another 20,000 in other nations, including Canada and South Africa. With this wave of emigration, the DP emigration crisis came to an endand DPs camps across Europe closed.  

3. About the Mural Lay-lah Lay-lah

Read the Artist Statement as a group. To distribute student copy, see  Student Handout: Mural Artist Statement. 

Artist Statement 

Lay-lah Lay-lah(Night Night, לַיְלָה לַיְלָה)

Ella Ponizovsky Bergelson 

“The Holocaust is often viewed as a closed chapter. This mural approaches this history as an evolving force that is still unfolding. The mural centers on the forced displacement that was triggered during that dark time. What was set in motion then continues to shape the present, reverberating through generations and continents, and echoing through identities and cultures. The mural holds space for the displaced and for their experiences of erasure and survival, shattering and repair. 

Every line of text in this mural was contributed by individuals from across Philadelphia, collected through a citywide call for memories. Participants shared lullabies, poems, and prayers from their childhoods—verses and melodies that act as building blocks of family heritage, folk narrative, and cultural memory. These contributions, depicted here in 28 languages set in 17 scripts, root the mural in lived experiences, making it an expression of collective remembrance and a reflection of Philadelphia. Just as individual memory is fluid and subjective, so is collective memory ever-evolving, reshaped by the narratives and silences of its time and place. Layered and partially concealed, the texts mirror how memory itself is passed on, bearing both the preserved and the lost. The mural asks: What is visible and what is obscured? What is remembered and carried forward, and what is lost to tragedy and time? How do memories shape the present and future?

The creation process reflects the mural’s central themes of uprooting and cultural resilience. Using a custom-developed method of writing, fragmenting, shifting, and overwriting, the composition juxtaposes eras, languages, and perspectives in a visual polyphony. Verses are overlaid, creating a space where identities are fractured and reassembled—always diverse, multifaceted, and forever in motion.

This mural stands here to honor the millions of victims of the Nazi genocide and the survivors who resettled in the Philadelphia region, whose legacy continues through this work. It is placed in direct conversation with Philadelphia’s civic promise, echoing its heritage as a sanctuary of tolerance and diversity. It is a reminder that the survival of cultures against all odds is a form of resistance, that liberty begins with the right to be different, and that Holocaust remembrance is, at its core, a commitment to harmonious coexistence.” 

Before beginning the activities, as a class discuss at least 2 of the following questions:  

• What other minorities aside from Jews were targeted and displaced by the Nazis? OR Based on what you read, how did displacement affect Jewish people during and after the Holocaust?

• How does this mural tell stories of displacement? How does the artist’s design reflect the theme of displacement?

• What does this artwork say about Philadelphia’s diversity?

• Knowing what you know now about the mural at the Holocaust Memorial Plaza, what do you think of the choice of portraying displacement through words rather than scenes?

 Now, watch the Student Video placed in the sidebar.

4. Small Group Activity: Mural Quotes Exploration   

Break your class into small groups. For each group, assign two quotes. Students will learn more about the quote’s history, importance, and why it is in the mural. See the Student Handout: Mural Quotes Exploration in the sidebar for all materials needed for this activity.  

The quotes are from:  

• Walk to Caesarea by Hannah Senesh 

• Mourner’s Kaddish, Hebrew Prayer 

• First They Came For… by Martin Niemöller  

• Over the Rainbow by Yip Harburg and Harold Arlen 

Students are asked to answer 2 questions about each quote:  

•  How does this quote connect to Holocaust history?
• Why do you think this quote was included in the mural?

5. Class Activity: Mural Inspired Team Artwork  

Each student is instructed to fill out the Student Handout: Personal Memories Form, placed in the Sidebar. In this form, they will answer the following questions:  

• What languages do you speak?

• What languages are spoken in your household?

• What is a story/poem/song/prayer that is important to you, your family, or your community?

After students complete the form (5 minutes), students will write or paint a word or phrase from their selected story/poem/song/prayer on a piece of paper. Whenever appropriate, encourage students to include languages other than English. Taking inspiration from Lay-lah Lay-lah, the teacher should then direct students to assemble the individual pieces together using glue or tape to create a community artwork.

During a workshop with members of the public, participants created a collaborative artwork inspired by the mural design