Learning and reading
Otto en Edith Frank take into account that hiding could be for a long period of time. The bring school books for their daughters.
Studying & Reading
The people in hiding kill time during the day with eating, sleeping, studying and reading. On May 16, 1944, Anne makes a long list in her diary of what everybody is studying and reading.
Mr. Van Pels: No courses; looks up many things in Knaur's Encyclopedia and Lexicon; likes to read detective stories, medical books and love stories, exciting or trivial.
Mrs. Van Pels: A correspondence course in English; likes to read biographical novels, and occasionally other kinds of novels.
Mr. Frank: Is learning English (Dickens!) and a bit of Latin; never reads novels, but likes serious, rather dry descriptions of people and places.
Mr. Pfeffer: Is learning English, Spanish and Dutch with no noticeable results; reads everything; goes along with the opinion of the majority.
Mrs. Frank: A correspondence course in English; reads everything except detective stories.
Peter van Pels: Is learning English, French (correspondence course), shorthand in Dutch, English and German, Commercial Correspondence in English, Woodworking, Economics and sometimes Math; seldom reads, sometimes geography.
Margot Frank: Correspondence courses in English, French and Latin, Shorthand in English, German and Dutch, Trigonometry, Solid Geometry, Mechanics, Physics, Chemistry, Algebra, Geometry, English Literature, French Literature, German Literature, Dutch Literature, Bookkeeping, Geography, Modern History, Biology, Economics; reads everything, preferably on religion and medicine.
Anne Frank: Shorthand in French, English, German and Dutch, Geometry, Algebra, History, Geography, Art History, Mythology, Biology, Bible History, Dutch Literature; likes to read biographies, dull or exciting, and history books (sometimes novels and light reading).