Young people under the Nazis

Question 1

What were the Nazis’ expectations of the way young people were to be educated?

Answer 1

• All young Germans brought up to be strong, healthy and proud of Nazi Germany
• Believed boys and girls were equal in importance, but had different strengths and should fulfil their gender roles

Question 2

What 2 main things were girls taught in Nazi Germany?

Answer 2

• Home economics: cooking, cleaning
• Race studies: focussed on identifying the perfect husband

Question 3

What 3 main things were boys taught in Nazi Germany?

Answer 3

• Maths: problem solving, based on war scenarios
• Race studies: focussed on identifying Ayran race
• History: focussed on greatness of Germany and the injustice of the ToV

Question 4

What was the Nazi school curriculum like?

Answer 4

• Bernhard Rust made education minister in 1934
• Saw education’s purpose as “making Nazis”

Question 5

What was the role of teachers like in Nazi Germany?

Answer 5

• All teachers had to swear loyalty to Hitler
• Expected to begin lessons with a “Heil Hitler” and decorate their classrooms with swastikas
• All had to join the Nazi Teachers’ Alliance
• Teachers had to make their support explicit; students encouraged to inform on them if they were not pro-Nazi
• April 1933: teachers began to be sacked

Question 6

What extracurricular organisations existed for boys?

Answer 6

• 6-10: Pimpfe (little fellows)
• 10-14: Deutsche Jungvolk (German young people)
• 14-18: Hitler Jugend (Hitler youth)

Question 7

What were the 2 aims of youth organisations for boys?

Answer 7

• Military and physical training
• Brainwashing with Nazi ideology

Question 8

What activities did boys do in youth groups?

Answer 8

• Military training: map reading, signalling, endurance exercise in winter
• 10 upwards: swore oaths of loyalty to Hitler
• Lessons on heroes of Germany, and how to inform on parents/teachers if suspected of betraying Nazis

Question 9

What extracurricular organisations existed for girls in Nazi Germany?

Answer 9

• 10-14: Jungmadel (young maidens)
• 14-21: Bund Deutscher Madel (league of German girls)

Question 10

What was the aim of youth organisations for girls?

Answer 10

Praparing girls for lives as wives and mothers.

Question 11

What activities did girls do in youth organisations?

Answer 11

• Athletics: being beautiful and strong for motherhood
• Trained to cook, iron and made beds
• Learned racial hygeine: only marrying Ayran men

Question 12

Give the timeline of events of youth organisations.

Answer 12

• 1933: rival youth groups closed down
• 1936: Hitler Youth Act - virtually impossible not to join
• 1939: above made compulsory (82% of young people were by now members)
• 1937: specialist, elite Nazi schools

Question 13

Why and when did youth organisations decrease in popularity?

Answer 13

• Older, experienced Youth leaders went to war during WW2
• Younger leaders took over
• The nature of organisations changed and became less popular