Democracy cannot be taken for granted, as we are seeing in many places around the world today. Liberal values and an open society must be defended and constantly reworked, especially through political education for young people.
Based on the life and thoughts of the resistance fighter Adam von Trott zu Solz, we offer a wide range of educational activities that are suitable for deepening and supplementing school lessons. We work together with various partners.
The extracurricular learning location Imshausen offers a special setting in which even difficult questions can be addressed and discussed.
Our offers are aimed at different target groups: we offer various courses for pupils at schools in the region; workshops and seminars for students, which also open up space for international encounters, and further training for political teachers on democracy education, media education and European political education at schools. You can find our guidelines for the educational programs in our educational concept.
The Adam von Trott, Imshausen e.V. Foundation focuses its educational work on the following core areas:
Our educational center is located in Imshausen, the place where the resistance fighter Adam von Trott spent much of his childhood and to which he was closely connected throughout his life. Here, pupils can explore the life and legacy of Adam von Trott in our permanent exhibition and ask themselves what this fate means for them today. We offer workshops on the exhibition, National Socialism, resistance, coming to terms with the past and the Imshausen memorial site for pupils of different school types and ages. We invite teachers to further training courses. The focus is on the relevance of historical events to the present day and dealing with current challenges such as racism, group-focused misanthropy and bullying. We also offer these workshops in cooperation with YLAB, the humanities student laboratory at the University of Göttingen.
The "spiritual origin" of the Adam von Trott Foundation is the Imshausen Community, which was founded by Adam's sister Vera and brothers and sisters in 1956 and has been living the ecumenical idea for decades, cultivating dialog with people from other religious communities, including non-Christian ones. The foundation also builds on these traditions in its educational work. It deliberately addresses diverse groups of pupils and works on the topics of respect, tolerance and religious freedom. A colloquium in 2019 explored how the ecumenical movement has contributed and continues to contribute to the "European peace project". We also address ecumenical and inter-religious issues in the Imshäuser Gespräche.
In the tradition of the Kreisau Circle, but also of the "Imshausen Society", which reflected on concepts and ideas for a democratic Germany after the war, the foundation offers a space for exchange and the active communication of alternative ideas for democratic, ecological and sustainable coexistence. The Imshäuser Gespräche, an educational program for adults, have become firmly established in this context. For many years, the foundation has also been cooperating with the Verein zur Förderung der Solidarischen Ökonomie e.V. (Association for the Promotion of the Solidarity Economy ) and organizes school workshops in Imshausen on solidarity-based economic activity for a sustainable future. The workshop on chocolate and fair trade, for example, was created in this context. International meetings with representatives of cooperatively organized businesses from the North Hesse region, as well as from France, Slovenia and Hungary, are also held as part of this collaboration. There has also been a long-standing cooperation with gewaltfrei handeln e.V.. Among other things, this has resulted in the educational game Civil Powker, which we offer as a workshop for pupils (see the list of courses on offer). This aims to reveal power relations, open up scope for action and invite reflection.
Together with our cooperation partners from the Adam von Trott Memorial Appeal at the University of Oxford and the Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, the Foundation organizes international graduate workshops for students on common themes of European coexistence. Topics include populism and 'post-truth', or civil resistance and social movements and their influence on politics. As part of a project funded by the EU "Europe for Citizens" programme with the Kreisau Foundation for European Understanding in Poland and two other civil society partners from the Czech Republic and Lithuania, the foundation organizes several student seminars on the topic of 1990/Year One. The democratic transformation in former Eastern Bloc countries. The aim is to make young people understand the significance of this year of change not only for the states and societies of the four partner countries, but also for the common European narrative. Here, too, the focus is on dialog between young people about the experiences of their parents' generation, about historical (up) and downturns and about future prospects in Europe.
Our workshops are offered in modularized form. The modules can be combined individually. This results in the possibility of half-day to multi-day programs.
approx. 3 hours, from 10th grade
Responsible: Magnus Hose
After a thematic introduction, the pupils explore the permanent exhibition in small groups. They work on different topics using workbooks. Presentations are then created and the results are presented and discussed in the group.
Content:
approx. 3 hours, from 10th grade
Responsible: Magnus Hose
The students deal with the different phases of remembering the victims of National Socialism in Germany. The focus is on the memory of the murdered resistance fighters and the fate of their families. Biographical portfolios are used to explore and discuss the lives of relatives of resistance fighters and forms of remembrance after 1945.
Content:
approx. 3 hours, from 9th grade
Responsible: Magnus Hose
Based on the historical modules, the students approach democratic values. The focus is on the questions "How do you actually become a democrat?" and "What kind of society do we want to live in?". Educational simulation games are used to examine and discuss individual concepts in more detail.
Content:
approx. 7-8 hours, from grade 11 (E)Groups of 18 - 40 participants
Responsible: Magnus Hose
Content: The simulation game was developed in cooperation with the YLAB at Göttingen University and the Adam von Trott Foundation, Imshausen e.V. It provides a lively approach to the Frankfurt National Assembly as an important event in the history of German democracy. Many of the fundamental rights adopted by the Frankfurt National Assembly, such as the freedom of assembly, also play a central role in our society today. Social movements in particular, such as Fridays for Future, make intensive use of the fundamental right of freedom of assembly to express their political demands. With the help of the simulation game, students learn about the most important political movements of the 1848 revolution and deal with the challenges faced by the first all-German parliament in its attempt to create a free German nation state.
The simulation game makes students aware that political compromises were often hard-won in the Paulskirche and that ultimately none of the parliamentary groups was able to fully implement their constitutional program. They thus learn that fact-based debate is an essential foundation of democratic decision-making processes.
Previous knowledge of the revolution of 1848/49 is helpful, but not necessary.
Project work (several weeks), from 9th gradePossible from small groups of 3 people
Responsible: Magnus Hose
Based on the life and work of Clarita von Trott, pupils should be empowered to change their perspective and search for traces of politically active women in their region during the war and post-war period. After all, it was not just "the men of July 20" who put up resistance.
- Working with historical sources - Researching and taking on the role of the researcher - Planning and conducting your own interviews with contemporary witnesses - Critically examining the narrative of "resisters in your own family"
approx. 2 hours, from 9th grade
Responsible: Magnus Hose
The foundation's public event series "Imshäuser Gespräche " can also be integrated into lessons. Every month, current topics and issues from society, politics, science or ecumenism are discussed in an evening event. The foundation invites experts to speak at these events. We are happy to welcome you on site, but you also have the opportunity to take part in the lectures online. This gives students an active insight into socio-political and scientific topics far removed from short summaries, reels and the like and encourages them to take part in the discussions.
The topic of the next Imshäuser Gespräch can be found here. If you are interested or have any questions, please contact our education officer.