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TEACHING FROM THE GRAVE
 Minnesauke Elementary School won The Bank of America Save Our History Classroom Award - a $10,000 cash prize to the school or educational organization that demonstrates exceptional commitment to the program through projects and implementation of lesson plans.
Awards Ceremony Slide Show >>
Press Release >>
Students from the Minnesauke Elementary School participated in a once-in-a-lifetime history and math lesson without even opening a textbook. Since October 2004, Mr. Paul Wilgenkamp's 6th grade class has been involved in a project to learn about the history of the Three Village area. In conjunction with the Three Village Historical Society, Cablevision and The History Channel, students are playing the role of young historians by gathering information from tombstones and then analyzing the data to draw conclusions about the history of the region. The data they collected is the first step in a long-term project by the Three Village Historical Society to create a searchable database for historical and genealogical research and to restore and preserve local cemeteries for future generations.
View Slide Show >>
Press Release >>
View Video About the Project
 Play (windows .wmv)
Play (quicktime .mov)
In October 2004, students visited the Setauket Presbyterian Cemetery, where they gathered a variety of data from tombstones. Working closely with Dr. Frank Turano, president of the Three Village Historical Society and Stony Brook University professor, students analyzed the data and drew many interesting conclusions. For instance:
- In1940 antibiotics were introduced. Based on this fact, they looked to see if, in fact, there was any difference in life expectancy before or after 1940. Their analysis yielded that there was a difference particularly in females who, prior to 1940, lived to an average age of 64 and after 1940 lived to an average age of 75.
- Students also looked at the number of deaths during different time periods and found a spike during 1841-1890. With this information, they sought to find out what had occurred during this time period. It turns out that after 1850, Setauket became a factory town, employing over 200 people by 1900 and thereby increasing the population.
These are only a few of the many keen observations made by the students.
On February 10, 2005 students presented their findings to a panel of experts that included Assemblyman Steve Englebright, Suffolk County Legislator Vivian Viloria-Fisher, Executive Director of the Three Village Historical Society Cathy Haenlein, History Channel's Chief Historian Dr. Libby O'Connell and Cablevision's Dodie Tschirch.
Unique to this project, the information collected by Mr. Wilgenkamp's 6th grade class will be used by 4th graders in the school as they study Long Island history and prepare for their tests.
See Teaching from the Grave Currriculum Unit
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