Social Studies

Build a light that celebrates the concept of stained glass. Choose from a variety of artist inspired themes or suggest one that your classroom would like to commemorate or honor. Decorate your light with artist inspired materials, designs, and patterns. Understand and demonstrate the difference between transparent, translucent, and opaque. How does light affect color and pattern? Designs that we have done in the past include:Chagall, Matisse, Alma Thomas, Joan Miro, Ruth Asawa, and Kieth Haring. We can create a light to suit your pedagogic and design curriculum.

Early Egyptians believed in eternity. They recorded the stories of their Pharaohs and people for you to understand 4,000 years later.

Discover how they built massive pyramids to protect the remains of their Pharaohs against time and thieves. They included models of all the comforts of life forever. Build a Pyramid to house the tomb and place the Sphinx outside to guard it. 

The legacy of the Museum begins in 1798 When Eli Whitney first chose a site on the Mill River to build his Armory. Chosen for its access to a strong current of water, Whitney intended to use this as a power source for the machines he would use to produce the parts of his contract musket. Whitney, however, was not the first to see the potential of this site as a grist mill had been located on the grounds previously. Over time the site has taken on new residencies and has physically changed as well.

Canal boats tell the story of the first bold man-made trade network, of community cooperation, of the ingenious use of water power. Construct a boat, its mules, people and canal bed in 1/4th" scale. Operate a model lock. With the rich illustrations of Peter Spier's Erie Canal ©1970

Connecticut History for the canal communities: New Haven, Hamden, Cheshire, Southington, Plainville

Each student constructs half inch scale figures and a traditional dwelling of northeastern indigenous peoples. We refer to the Quinnipiac who once lived in the region around the museum. Adapting contemporary materials with the resourcefulness once applied to barks, skins, and shells, students create a diorama of Indigenous Native American life in the past.