Determined to Stay
By Samia Shoman and Jody Sokolower
Overview
These lessons are based on the young adult book Determined to Stay: Palestinian Youth Fight for Their Village. Like the book, they focus on youth in the Palestinian village of Silwan, which is just outside the Old City in East Jerusalem. Because Palestinian history and current reality can seem “too complicated to understand,” centering on one village provides an effective and accessible introduction.
“Determined to Stay: A Case Study Examining the Idea of Home—Connecting Silwan, Palestine, to Communities in the United States” is designed as a stand-alone activity to introduce students to issues in East Jerusalem that relate to challenges students may be facing in their own communities—including forced relocation, criminalization of youth, and the struggle to strengthen and protect a culture of resistance. It uses students’ own definitions of “home” and what has or might threaten their own homes as the point of departure. The central activity is a jigsaw activity based on five narratives from the book: 14-year-old Sara, whose Silwan home was destroyed when she was 8; Hatem, a teenager from Hebron who is precariously living and working in Jerusalem without legal papers, although his home is less than 20 miles away; Yacoub, who was 8 during the 1948 forcible expulsion of everyone from his village; Corrina, whose Ohlone people’s history in the San Francisco Bay Area closely parallels that of Yacoub; and Ayesha, a Palestinian American teenager.
“Determined to Stay: An Introduction” is designed to prepare and engage students at the beginning of a unit based on reading all or excerpts of Determined to Stay: Palestinian Youth Fight for Their Village. The central activity is a “meet and greet” that introduces 11 people from the book. We hope it will generate excitement about the book and many questions and predictions that you can explore during your unit.
Both lessons include maps, essential vocabulary, and multimedia resources.
Determined to Stay: A Case Study
Determined to Stay Lesson Plan
This curriculum contains two lessons.
Supporting Materials
Assignments
Jigsaw Activity
(from slide 9): Divide students into groups of four (this works best in person, but can be easily adapted to breakout groups online). Distribute copies of the graphic organizer and Sara’s story (Story A in the text set):
Links and Other Resources
Below are links to other rersources and social media accounts related to this topic that you may consider following: