Anne Frank Character Change

Character Change: The Diary of Anne Frank

Introduction

People of all ages, from all parts of the world, write about their thoughts and experiences each day in journals, diaries, or blogs.

Anne Frank, a young girl who lived in a time of war, was one of them. What kinds of things might she have written in her diary?

Purpose

In this lesson, you will explore how Anne’s writing demonstrates what she went through while she was in hiding from the Nazis, and how those experiences affected her character—her way of thinking and acting.

Life in Hiding: Watch It!

Anne's early diary entries described her happy and carefree life as a 13-year-old girl. But after she was forced to go into hiding, her diary described the problems of living in the crowded secret apartment with seven other people.

This video shows Anne making her way through the secret apartment. All of the videos in this lesson are dramatizations, in which actors show the events and speak the thoughts that Anne recorded in her diary. As you watch, think about how Anne reacts to her situation.

Life in Hiding

https://illinois.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/midlit11.soc.wh.annefrank/the-diary-of-anne-frank/

Open Ended

What does this dramatization tell you about Anne’s character when she first went into hiding? Write one to two sentences that describe how Anne was feeling in her new, secret apartment.

The Scare: Watch It!

Anne and her family lived in constant fear that the Nazis would find them. They were even more afraid after they learned that other Jewish people had been discovered and sent to concentration camps, where they were killed.

This video dramatization shows how Anne and her family are almost discovered by the Nazis, and how terrifying this is for them. In this scene, Nazis come close to discovering the secret entrance to the hiding place, before the man helping Anne and her family gets the soldiers to leave and then opens the door himself.

The Scare

https://illinois.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/midlit11.soc.wh.annefrank/the-diary-of-anne-frank/

Open Ended

After you watch the video, write two to three sentences that answer the following question: How would living with this kind of fear change someone's character?

I Want to Be a Writer: Watch It!

As Anne learned more about what was happening to Jewish people in Europe, her writing began to change.

In this video, she talks with her sister about her reasons for writing. As you watch, think about how Anne's new purpose for writing her diary shows changes in her character.

I Want to Be a Writer

https://illinois.pbslearningmedia.org/resource/midlit11.soc.wh.annefrank/the-diary-of-anne-frank/

Open Ended

Anne wanted her diary to be published after the war, so that people around the world would know what the Nazis had done to the Jewish people of Europe. Her diary entries showed a change in her character, as she found a new purpose in her life. Her entries became more serious, too, as Anne wrote about why human beings do terrible things and questioned whether humans are basically good or evil.

In the previous video, Anne told her sister, "I don't want to have lived in vain" ("in vain" means for no reason). Why did Anne come to see her diary as a way to give her life meaning?