Savannah Georgia is the perfect place to bring your students on an educational exploration. Savannah is rich in history and wildlife and offers several adventures that will make learning more fun!
First stop: The Savannah Visitor Information Center and Savannah History Museum showcase the city’s history from its founding in 1733 to the present day. Inside, you can see exhibits about the Revolutionary War Battle of Savannah, rare dugout canoes from the 1800s and a changing exhibit of women’s fashions from the 19th and 20th centuries. The museum is also home to Forrest Gump’s bench, one of Johnny Mercer’s Oscar Awards and a carriage owned by the family of Girl Scouts founder Juliette Gordon Low. Other exhibits include weapons and military uniforms, as well as items from Savannah’s railway history. Visitors may also enjoy our plush theatre and film presentation, "Savannah the Survivor."
Take a Tour: Get to know Savannah by experiencing a city tour, either on a period-style trolley tour or with one of our highly trained step-on-guides. Tours last about two hours and will help your group get better acquainted with our genteel Southern beauty. It will also give them a sample of the attractions they may want to explore later on their own.
Lunch: The Savannah Riverboat’s narrated sightseeing Educational Cruise is the perfect choice for an exciting day outside of the classroom. The 600-passenger Savannah River Queen and the 600-passenger Georgia Queen, both triple-decker riverboats are outfitted in an early 1900s décor and allow students to get the feel of the river just as our forefathers did decades ago. Both students and teachers will enjoy the captain’s narration as he points out areas of interest along the historic Savannah River.
Explore Savannah: Want a great way to learn about Savannah while having fun and winning prizes? How about a Scavenger Hunt! Fun Tours of Savannah offers your group a map and clues to find Savannah’s hidden treasures. This interactive learning will help your group better appreciate the history of Savannah.
Next, stop by the Telfair Museum of Art. A vital art educational resource, the Telfair is the only art institution in Savannah to offer "visual literacy" tours, which encourage critical thinking and group discussion. The Telfair creates curriculum-based teacher materials to help instructors prepare for field trips and offers resources including a free video and CD-ROM lending library.
Dinner: Your group covered a lot of ground on their first day and may want to have a casual bite to eat. Savannah’s historic River Street and City Market have all types of casual and upscale dining options. Seafood, steaks and light fare can all be found in the restored cotton warehouses that are home to some of Savannah’s favorite restaurants. We can help you determine which restaurants are particularly group friendly!
An Evening with Ghosts: Discover why Savannah has repeatedly been named “America’s Most Haunted City!” There are numerous options to choose from, including walking tours and haunted trolley tours. This makes a great evening event for your group and will be entertaining, fun and informative, no matter the age.
Visit Savannah’s Beach: Before reaching Tybee Island stop by Oatland Island Education Center, a premier environmental education center in the Southeast. More than 40 programs are available to students ranging from an hour-long barn animal program for kindergarteners to programs where older students study endangered species, organism classification, participate in team building activities and camp overnight. More than 50 indigenous Georgia animals are used in educational programming, many of which are an endangered and/or threatened species. Most animals are located on a two-mile trail in large, natural enclosures. Animals living at Oatland include bison, Florida panthers, wolves, alligators, bear and diverse raptors.
Lunch: After such an exciting morning your students are sure to work up an appetite. Try Tybee’s local fare at The Sugar Shack, the Crab Shack or Fannie’s on the Beach. These are among the great choices for your students to have a fun lunch!
Explore Tybee: Several companies in the Savannah area offer dolphin and nature tours. Explore the rivers, marshes and barrier islands aboard Coast Guard certified vessels. Watch dolphins at play and egrets catching fish. See what is under the water when we pull our crab traps. Learn about the marshland and the barrier island ecosystems.
Next, visit the Tybee Island Marine Science Center (TIMSC) where educational programs and activities are offered throughout the year at the Science Center, on the beach and in the marsh. TIMSC offers a variety of programs for students of all ages. Outdoor classes include a beach walk encompassing general beach ecology, sand sifting in the Intertidal Zone, seining, a marsh ecology walk, basic oceanography, beach profiling, and a floating classroom boat excursion. Indoor classes include a center tour & touch tank, a dock lab on marine invertebrates, a mollusk dissection, fish printing and anatomy, and a presentation on sharks and fish with bones.
Before heading back to the mainland, stop by the Tybee Island Light Station. Ordered by General James Oglethorpe, Governor of the 13th colony, in 1732, the lighthouse has been guiding mariners to a safe entrance into the Savannah River for more than 270 years. The Tybee Island Light Station is one of America's most intact having all of its historic support buildings on its five-acre site. To visit the lighthouse in the evening and if your group is more than 10 people you will need to schedule your visit. Allow an hour and a half for the visit.
Dinner: If your group enjoys dining with a bit of a twist, they will certainly look forward to tonight’s dinner. Among the choices are a “Mess and Muster” at local Fort Jackson, where they’ll enjoy a delicious meal along with friendly soldiers of long ago, complete with a cannon firing!
Take a Tour: The Mighty Eighth Air Force Museum places a high priority on educational programs for school groups and other visitors. During the past year, more than 15,000 students participated in one or more of the museum’s educational programs. Program content is age-appropriate and tailored to meet school curriculum standards. They have several different tours/programs available to match the educational needs of various groups. In this way, the classroom teacher is partnering with the educational staff so that both student and teacher may participate in an authentic learning experience.
Lunch: Head back to town and take your students over to the Pirates’ House for a quick and easy lunch. Here the students will feel like real pirates with great seafood and a seafaring atmosphere.
Continue the Fun: After lunch at the Pirates’ House, your students will want to continue the maritime fun at the Ships of the Sea Maritime Museum. Founded in 1966, exhibits ship models, paintings and maritime antiques, principally from the great era of Atlantic trade and travel between England and America during the 18th and 19th centuries. For students, the museum offers classes on the art of scrimshaw, sailor's valentines and painted merchant signs.
Dinner: Your students have had a fun-filled three days in Savannah - let them choose where to eat dinner! There are plenty of options on both River Street and in City Market, as well as other delicious choices throughout the Historic District.
Angela Beasley’s Puppet People: Students of all ages enjoy exercising their imaginations, sparked by the instructions and supplies at a Puppet People Hands-On Workshop! Kids from all over the country are catching the puppet-making fever with this 2 ½ hour program.
Old Fort Jackson’ Student Militia: Find out what it was like to be an American soldier in the beginning years of the United States. A drill sergeant will teach your students the basic maneuvers of the School of the Soldier, including marching and saluting. Afterward, students will enter an informal classroom setting to learn about the role communication and food and equipment played in the history of Fort Jackson. The training is completed when the students witness an exciting cannon firing demonstration. After they have been dismissed, students may take time to see a 15-minute theater presentation which provides a more detailed history of Fort Jackson in the Civil War, the War of 1812 and the American Revolution. Students may also visit the museum located inside the fort, where they will walk through the casemate rooms where soldiers once lived.
Savannah Wildlife Refuge: Established in April 6, 1927, the refuge consists of more than 29,000 acres of freshwater marshes, tidal rivers and creeks and bottomland hardwoods. The refuge is located in the heart of the Lowcountry, a band of low land, bordered on the west by sand hill ridges and on the east by the Atlantic Ocean. Known for its rich flora during the humid summer months, the region also supports a diverse wildlife population. The variety of birdlife within the Lowcountry is enhanced by its location on the Atlantic Flyway.
5 Star Family Fun Park: One of Savannah’s premier entertainment destinations, complete with arcades, a moon bounce, miniature golf and laser tag.
Star Castle Family Entertainment Center: The fun center that has it all! Featuring go carts, putt-putt, arcade games, laser tag, batting cages and even roller skating.
Bull River Cruises: Take an educational tour with Savannah's largest ecotourism provider. Bull River Cruises specializes in fun learning cruises exploring the rich history and nature of Coastal Georgia and the Savannah River. Come explore Wildlife Refuges, the Port of Savannah, Tidal Creeks with dolphins and Barrier Islands. Experience the beauty of the waterways of Coastal Georgia with Bull River Cruises.
Wilderness Southeast Wildlife & Nature Tours: Students of all ages enjoy discovery field trips exploring the habitat and wildlife interactions found in beach, cypress swamps, salt marsh, estuary, or the tidal freshwater unique to Georgia’s coast. All field trips can be customized by this non-profit educational organization to meet school curriculum standards.
