LongHouse Reserve naturally lends itself to the preschool population. It is an ideal setting to focus on color, shape, form and function          

Pre-school curriculum is under construction.

LongHouse Reserve Curriculum for Elementary and Middle School Levels
By Irene Tully

Any trip to LongHouse Reserve offers numerous opportunities to integrate curriculum across all disciplines. Although the experience is inspiring for the students to just "be" in the space, the following threads are ways to weave the trip and learning into something more. It is hoped that teachers and their classes will make return visits to this learning laboratory in order to make LongHouse Reserve a memorable and important place for children and adults on Long Island. 

Language Arts: 

LongHouse Reserve lends itself to poetry whether created on site or back in the classroom. The elements of poetry-images, feelings, questions or wondering, rhythm and repetition-should be familiar to the students. Students should bring along notebooks or journals to record their observations in words and pictures. Learning to "see" carefully is the key to good writing. Writers notice what other people walk right by. Plan to stop at several spots in the gardens for kids to spend five or ten minutes writing. Some suggestions would be: the amphitheater, the maze of grasses (fall only), next to the Atlas Cedar tree, or Grace Knowlton's concrete spheres, Untitled'

As an example, back at school the day after our visit we brainstormed our impressions and I wrote a huge web on the chalkboard. I found that students remembered and wrote about the bronze bell, the Study in Heightened Perspective by Jack Lenor Larsen, Tree Man in the Forest by Toshiko Takaezu, Council Ring, Chihuly's Green Serpent and hanging sculpture, Cosmos, the pond, Golden Path, Torso, Bridge. Attaching names to certain areas and sculptures helped them remember and write.

Follow-up visits to LongHouse Reserve can be for reading purposes, too. The setting is a peaceful one and I can picture my students stretched out on a beautiful day, just lost in a book. The amphitheater would be a great place for a read aloud.

Science and the Environment:

Students visiting LongHouse Reserve will be observing plants, flowers and trees of many varieties. They will see how to plan an environment by the recycling of the earth.  When both the pond and house foundation were dug the amphitheater was created.  Today this is often used as a performance space. The Council Ring was constructed of recycle trees that were cleared from an area. The trunks of trees were split in half and have been turned into benches adjacent to the composting area.

The pond offers a chance to test the water to determine its ph or temperature. A sample could be taken and studied for algae and micro-organisms. If you bring along hand-held pocket scopes, students would be able to inspect plants closely. On our first visit a student with a magnifying lens spotted tiny aphids on top of the red cedar posts in Jack Larsen's Study in Heightened Perspective.

Beginning botanists will have a field-day in the gardens. Field guides to plants and garden would be a helpful resource to students who want more information on site. Learning how to draw and diagram flora is a valuable way to increase and develop observation skills. Colored pencils, sketch journals, and/or paper on clipboards would help connect both science and art.

Hopefully students will be motivated by their visit to create gardens back at their schools, where they may be involved in planning, researching and designing landscapes. A visit to LongHouse Reserve should inspire all visitors to see how art and nature can co-exist.

Mathematics:

The sculptures at LongHouse Reserve beg to be measured. Geometry in art and nature is what the landscape and gallery offer. There is a wide selection of sculptural shapes throughout the gardens from the concrete spheres to red posts in the Study in Heightened Perspective by Jack Larsen. Math lessons could include estimating the distance between pieces, identifying and measuring the kinds of angles in Claus Bury's Homage to the Brooklyn Bridge. You can use the field experience to recognize and find math; if students bring along some tools like meter wheels, protractors, string or tape measures, they can estimate first and then find actual results. Measuring in metric as well as standard units in this dramatic place would make a lasting impression. Again, giving the students the "eyes to see" math in the world all around them is possible at LongHouse.

Since pattern is really the basis of mathematics, students will have many opportunities during a visit to notice and study the patterns in leaves, bundles of needles, the ferns and grasses. Bringing along magnifying glasses will help them view things close up.

The architecture of the LongHouse, itself, can lead to math studies involving geometry. Students this age might be asked to list what you would need to know and do to design and build such a structure. 

Social Studies/Geography and History:

On the initial guided tour of the property, students will learn about plants from around the globe. Countries of Western Africa, Korea, Greece, Finland, China, and Japan are mentioned when the artists or flora are described. Follow up activities after our visit included finding these places on a world map or globe. Small hand size world maps could be brought along as learning tools to make an instant geography connection (such laminated notebook-size maps are available at low cost).

A social studies unit on Greek culture may focus on the amphitheater (#4 on Reserve map). Where is it located? How was it constructed? Why was this form created at LongHouse? What type of functions follows this form?

When back in the classroom, extend learning by encouraging students to search out topics of interest on the internet. My class became interested in finding out more about: