“New Haven A guide to Architecture and Urban Design” by Elizabeth Mills Brown, pp. 100-118 will provide all the information you need to prepare a great trip. The book is available at any book store or library in the area. Limit the trip to the streets immediately around the Green as there is a lot to see for little kids. Start the tour at the Library, if you walk on the Green side of the street the whole tour can be done without crossings to negotiate. The tour will end on the corner of Elm & Temple Streets where it began. Take pictures and make simple drawings to record basic appearance of the buildings.
Suggestions for buildings to focus on;
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1. New Haven Free Public Library, corner of Temple & Elm Streets. Count the columns, windows & doors. Look at the shapes of windows and the door.
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2. New Haven County Courthouse, corner of Elm & Church Streets. Count the columns etc., (if you can brave it, here the kids could really get into the architecture by walking up & down the steps and around the columns and sculpture.)
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3. Union Trust Company, corner Elm & Church Streets. A tower. Look at the window patterns. Note location of the door.
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4. New Haven Savings Bank, diagonally across from the Courthouse, on the corner of Church & Elm Streets. A tower. How are #3 and #4 alike or different?
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5. City Hall, Church & Court Streets. Look at the tower, arcade, window shapes and patterns. Where is the door?
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6. Post Office and Federal District Court, Church & Court Streets. Columns and colonnade, find the triangle.
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7. Chapel Square, Chapel Street. Note the shape of the building. What is it made of? Are there different kinds of windows? Where is the door?
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8. The churches on the Green. Trinity Church, corner of Chapel & Temple Streets. Center Church, Temple Street proceeding toward Elm Street. The North Church, corner of Temple & Elm Streets. Repeat questioning process as above.