IWitness is an educational website developed by USC Shoah Foundation – The
Institute for Visual History and Education that provides access to 1,467 full life histories, testimonies of survivors and witnesses to the Holocaust
and other genocides for guided exploration. IWitness brings the human stories
of the Institute's Visual History Archive to secondary school teachers and
their students via engaging multimedia-learning activities. Designed to be
participatory, academic and student-driven, IWitness addresses education
standards from the Common Core State Standards Initiative (United States) and
the International Society for Technology in Education, among others.
You can watch a short video demonstration of IWitness
IWitness enables educators and their students to watch, search, edit, and share
video, images, and other content within a secure, password-protected space. IWitness
is available over the Internet. No software to download and install.
Designed for Educators
IWitness is designed to be flexible and provide educators a variety of ways to integrate
video testimony into their curriculum. Because it is available over the Internet,
educators can use IWitness inside and outside of the classroom. Educators can have
their students use IWitness for homework or they can choose to highlight short clips
to use in their lessons. They can even incorporate IWitness as a semester-long experience,
involving in-classroom activities and student-authored video projects. Educators
can also develop their own activities specific to their own subject areas and interests
using the IWitness Activity Builder.
- IWitness includes features for teachers, including guidelines for using Holocaust
survivor and witness testimony in education. The guidelines offer practical information
and tips about how to integrate video testimony into classroom lessons and projects.
Secure Student Moderation
- Teachers who assign students an activity using IWitness will be able to view student
projects in a secure and contained "classroom" within the IWitness site that is
personal to the student and can only be viewed and assessed by the teacher.
- Students have the opportunity to use technology to become more active learners
while encountering survivors and other eyewitnesses talking about their experiences
before, during and after the Holocaust. This application empowers them to participate
in their own learning by providing them with the tools to think critically, investigate,
develop projects, analyze, and collaborate with others.
- This application responds to the demand to build multi-literacies skills and responsible
digital citizenship among educators and students. To this end, among the many curricular
standards it will incorporate, this resource aligns with standards offered by the
International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) (www.iste.org).
Relating History to Real Lives
IWitness is a leading-edge tool for the classroom that features the life stories
of citizens from many countries and their experiences as survivors and witnesses
of the Holocaust. These are personal narratives that provide students the opportunity
to understand the impact that historical events have on individuals, communities,
and society as a whole.
If you have additional questions about IWitness, you may find it helpful to visit
our FAQ page. If you would like to contact the USC Shoah
Foundation, please visit our Contact Page.