Jackson Field Trips Guide

Field Trip Categories In And Around Jackson

Science, STEM, And Discovery

Mississippi Museum of Natural Science
Mississippi Museum of Natural Science sits within LeFleur's Bluff State Park and combines indoor galleries with trails and wetland views, allowing students to connect specimens to living Mississippi habitats. Large aquariums hold native fish, reptiles, and other aquatic life, while fossils, birds, mammals, and geological displays interpret the state's natural history. Elementary groups can compare river, swamp, forest, and coastal species; middle and high school students can study biodiversity, invasive species, water quality, and how the Mississippi River and Gulf Coast shape the state. Outdoor trails make the museum particularly useful for field science, though heat and humidity matter. Teachers should choose one habitat and ask students to compare the museum's controlled display with the messier evidence found outside—tracks, sounds, plant layers, and water conditions.
Street Address: 2148 Riverside Dr, Jackson, MS 39202
Web Address: https://www.mdwfp.com/museum

Museums, Tours, And Local Landmarks

Mississippi Civil Rights Museum
The Mississippi Civil Rights Museum traces the state's central and often violent role in the modern civil-rights movement. Galleries address segregation, Emmett Till, Medgar Evers, Freedom Summer, voting-rights campaigns, school integration, church activism, and the organizing work of ordinary Mississippians. Photographs, oral histories, artifacts, documents, and immersive installations show how law and terror reinforced white supremacy and how people resisted. Grades 6 through high school are the appropriate audience; some content is emotionally intense for younger children. Teachers should prepare students with chronology and local geography, then leave time for reflection. The museum shares a complex with the Museum of Mississippi History, allowing a powerful comparison between one focused movement and the broader state story. Students should look for the difference between national leaders and local organizers whose names are less familiar.
Street Address: 222 North St, Jackson, MS 39201
Web Address: https://mcrm.mdah.ms.gov/

Mississippi Children's Museum
Mississippi Children's Museum uses play-based exhibits to support literacy, health, STEM, arts, and Mississippi culture for young children. Galleries invite building, climbing, reading, role play, movement, and problem solving, while outdoor areas add gardens and physical exploration. Preschool through about grade 5 is the primary audience, with the strongest value for groups that allow children to make choices rather than march through every station together. Teachers can use exhibits to practice vocabulary, measurement, cooperation, and cause-and-effect; families often find that children return repeatedly to a single challenge. The museum's Literacy Garden and state-focused elements help connect classroom skills with place. School groups should divide into small chaperoned teams because hands-on museums become less educational when too many students crowd one activity.
Street Address: 2145 Museum Blvd, Jackson, MS 39202
Web Address: https://mschildrensmuseum.org/

Arts, Culture, And Performance

Mississippi Museum of Art
Mississippi Museum of Art combines a collection of American and regional art with exhibitions that increasingly examine the South through contemporary, Indigenous, Black, and community perspectives. The Art Garden extends exhibitions outdoors into downtown Jackson, where sculpture, lawn, and events create a public gathering space. Upper elementary students can study visual storytelling, landscape, and portraiture; middle and high school groups can compare how artists represent race, place, memory, and Southern identity. Changing exhibitions are central to the museum, so teachers should research the current show and artists before arrival. The museum is particularly effective when students compare a historical image of Mississippi with a contemporary artist's response and ask how viewpoint, medium, and intended audience reshape the story.
Street Address: 380 S Lamar St, Jackson, MS 39201
Web Address: https://www.msmuseumart.org/

Gardens, Parks, And Outdoor Learning

Mississippi Agriculture and Forestry Museum
Mississippi Agriculture and Forestry Museum spreads across a large campus with farm equipment, historic structures, a recreated small town, gardens, and exhibits on crops, forestry, transportation, and rural industry. Students can see tractors, gins, mills, tools, and buildings that make the scale of agricultural work tangible. Grades 3 through 8 can trace cotton, timber, or food from raw material to processing and market; older students can add mechanization, labor, soil, and the social history of plantation agriculture. Teachers should explicitly include the roles of enslaved laborers, sharecroppers, and agricultural workers rather than presenting machines as the whole story. Seasonal demonstrations and festivals can add depth. The campus is large and outdoors, so school groups should choose a route organized around one commodity or technology.
Street Address: 1150 Lakeland Dr, Jackson, MS 39216
Web Address: https://www.msagmuseum.org/

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