Salisbury and South Wiltshire Museum uses its collections, building and services to encourage learning, inspiration and enjoyment.

Early Years

Early years groups are FREE to explore the museum. For a donation of £30 per group, we can also provide a facilitated activity to help you explore the collections.

The museum-led session is called Treasure and lasts an hour. Children will have a chance to handle mystery objects with one of the Learning Team who will take them into a wierd and wonderful world of giants, buried treasure and animals, and lead their own learning through the museum with a range of tools to help them.

The museum is also happy to come to you and bring along our collection of Fossils. Circle time takes about 20 minutes, when we explore mammoth teeth, dinosaur bones and go on a river valley safari. Then the team are happy to stay for the rest of the morning whilst the children drop in to an activity with clay and natural materials. We will then turn the children’s clay play into their very own fossils to take home.

The cost for this session is £15 donation for the fossil handling only, or £2.50 per head (min of 15 children) for the clay activity. Travel is 40p per mile round trip.

All the activities are fully risk assessed and staff and volunteers are CRB cleared.

Schools

Download the museum’s Primary School Education Programme to see the fantastic range of activities your school can take part in at the museum and in the classroom.

All facilitated sessions are closely linked to the curriculum and to the needs of schools. Children can take part in costumed role-play, drama, historical investigation and discovery, and art activities. All our sessions include object handling and support literacy skills.

Visits to the Museum are FREE for schools funded by Wiltshire Council.

View our feedback from schools.

Outreach

We offer an outreach service to all schools within South Wiltshire and to schools lining the county border near Salisbury.

Community Groups
The museum’s outreach offer extends to community groups through a programme of delivered sessions and talks at your centre, school or hall. We also have resources for reminiscence projects, and are keen to hear from after school groups, holiday clubs and youth groups who want to offer something different to thei members.

Families
Regular family activities take place at Salisbury and South Wiltshire Museum, especially during the half-term and holidays, including family friendly events, creative workshops, family tours and drop in ‘make and take’ sessions. There are also talks, tours, courses and events for adults held throughout the year. Look at the Events section or contact us to find out more.