School Tour Options

girl child looking through magnifying glass

 

This Fall, we are bringing the Museum right into your classroom via Zoom! All 45-minute programs are held LIVE with a museum staff member and feature a craft or other engaging activity. Tour content is aligned with state of Alabama curriculum standards.  

VIRTUAL FIELD TRIP PROGRAM OPTIONS

Grades K-3

  • Storytelling Through Time: This program examines the importance of storytelling in all cultures in human history with specific examples from cultures represented in the Museum: Woodland, Mississippian, French, and African-American. Students listen to three different stories and discuss the lessons found in each. 
  • Prehistoric Pottery: Students learn to identify different types of prehistoric pottery and the ways archaeologists can use them to understand the people of the past. Students also learn how to make their own pinch pot out of clay! 

Grades 3-6

  • General Alabama Prehistory & History: See some of the museum’s diverse collections and life-sized scenic representations of over 12,000 years of Alabama’s prehistory and history. Students plunge back in time as they explore the ways of life of ancient Woodland cultures, mound-building Mississippian peoples, early French settlers, and an African-American family after the Civil War.

  • Foragers to Farmers: Archaeologists reconstruct past diet by examining a wide variety of artifacts and ecofacts. In this program, students in grades 5 and up examine real artifacts to compare nomadic hunting and gathering peoples to sedentary farming peoples.

  • Tools of the Trade: What's in an archaeologist's backpack? In this program, students learn about the different types of tools and basic scientific techniques archaeologists use to uncover the past. 
  • Stratigraphy: In this program, students learn about stratigraphy and how archaeologists can "read" different layers of soil to learn how people in the past lived their daily lives. Students also help match different artifacts to different time periods.

Middle and High School

  • Bone Detectives: This program explores how archaeologists can study skeletal remains to learn more about the past. Students learn how archaeologists can use bones to determine an individual's age, sex, height, and more! 
  • Archaeology 101: Archaeologists use many approaches to uncover the past and decipher how people lived. Throughout the visit, students learn about the archaeological discipline, the many techniques used to reconstruct the past, and what it takes to become an archaeologist. Topics include radiocarbon dating, ground-penetrating radar, and experimental archaeology.

  • Science & Archaeology: Students learn how different branches of science, such as chemistry, physics, geology, and biology inform archaeological research. The lesson highlights how science is used to help locate sites, date sites and artifacts, provide information on past landscapes and climates and much more.