Fall and Winter Workshops

Halloween School and Camp Programs
Starts in the last week of September for school groups (September 25) with a special price of $7.00 per child. In October, $8.00 per child.


Charlie Gets His Cloak - Grades Pre-K-2; available in October and January through March
This workshop brings literature to life in a hands-on exploration of the new children's classic Charlie Needs a Cloak by Tomie dePaola. Activities and demonstrations allow students to participate step by step in the discovery of how a sheep's haircut is turned into a warm and beautiful garment. At the conclusion of the workshop the children take home their own miniature version of Charlie's new cloak.

Curriculum Themes Addressed:
· How early Americans met their needs
· How seasons affect our lives
· Differences between then and now

Language Arts Standard Skills Enhanced:
· Listening
· Comprehension
· Speaking
· Identify, explain, and evaluate ideas
· Use illustrations to understand text

Lighting the Way - Grades K-3; available in October and January through March

Our most popular workshop helps students learn how people lit their homes and businesses before electricity. Each student makes his or her own candle to take home and see demonstrations of a variety of early lighting devices. A visit to two historic buildings illuminates the use of lighting in the context of daily life.

Curriculum Themes Addressed:
· Challenge of meeting needs and wants
· Economic decision making
· People using human, capital, and natural resources
· People depending on and modifying the physical environment

Fiber to Thread - Grades K-5; available in October and January through March

This workshop focuses on pre-industrial textile production as students experience for themselves the stages of making flax into linen thread and sheep's wool into woolen thread. Students always enjoy breaking flax, carding wool, and trying out the drop-spindle. A visit to some of the historic buildings allows them to consider the uses and value of cloth in early American communities.

Curriculum Themes Addressed:
· People depending on and modifying the physical environment
· Challenge of meeting needs and wants
· People using human, capital, and natural resources
· Colonial and revolutionary periods

Trash or Treasure? - Grades 4-8; available January through March
Students have the hands-on opportunity to investigate how historians use primary source documents, objects and architecture as clues to life in the past. They practice being historical detectives as they sort through collections of artifacts and try to determine what sort of site or building they might have come from. Students also tour some of the historic buildings to explore what old structures can reveal about the past.

Curriculum Themes Addressed:
· Colonial and Revolutionary periods
· Life in the new nation
· Urbanization: economic, political, and social impacts

Skills Enhanced:
· Analysis
· Placing objects and events in context
· Building conclusions from evidence

You be the Judge - Grades 5-12; available January through March

Students take on the roles of participants in a 19th century court as they enact a trial scenario in the 1837 Third County Courthouse. This workshop allows students to explore the rights and responsibilities of citizenship as well as issues of 19th century community life.

Curriculum Themes Addressed:
· Government of the United States
· Citizenship and civic life
· Life in the new nation

Skills Enhanced:
· Analysis
· Building conclusions from evidence
· Public speaking

Cooking up the Past - Grades 3-8;

My Own Quilt - Grades 2-4;