Planning Your School Tour
Guided Group Tours
Tours fill quickly, so submit your online application early. The Education Department urges you to schedule tours October through February when possible to avoid our most crowded period: March, April, and May. Tours are scheduled Tuesday through Sunday beginning at 10 am. The charge for a 50-minute tour is $4 per person for children and chaperones (one teacher per 25 students is free). Art and Poetry is $5 per student. The minimum number of students is 10. Parking is free in the Museum lot, and additional metered parking is available nearby.
Self-Guided Tours
Teachers and group leaders must notify the Education Department in advance when bringing a self-guided group of ten or more. One adult must accompany each group of ten students. The adult is responsible for seeing that his or her group follows Museum rules and maintains appropriate behavior. Museum policy is mailed when a self-guided tour is scheduled. A visit beginning at NOON or after is highly recommended for self-guided tours because most docent led tours are conducted in the morning. Priority is given to docent-led tours in the galleries. The Museum reserves the right to deny admission to self-guided groups that arrive without reservations. Regular Museum admission fee applies. Gallery activities are available at the information desk for self-guided groups.
Guide By Cell Tours
Use your cell phone to learn more about works of art, artists, and more. With this interactive, user-friendly tool, visitors enhance their museum experiences by using their cell phone to learn more about the works they are seeing and the artists who created them. With Guide by Cell, museum visitors dial a phone number and then select the code that appears next to the artwork to learn more about the piece. Visitors may stay on the same call throughout their visit and the only charges incurred are their cell phone minutes and any roaming charges.
Other Tour Options
Teachers who would like their groups to spend time in the galleries after a docent-led tour need to notify the Education Department when scheduling their tours. Please follow the guidelines for self-guided tours. Teachers may arrange in advance to have their students sketch in the galleries of the permanent collections after a docent-led tour. At least one adult must accompany each group of ten students. Each student must have a sketch pad and writing surface and use pencils (no pens or markers). Optimal sketching time is 20-30 minutes.
Learn more about other tour options
Pre-Tour Preparation. It's Free!
We highly recommend that you prepare students for their Museum visit by borrowing our classroom resource packets or requesting a Docent-in-the-School to present a classroom packet.
Most CD-ROM resources can be obtained free of charge and picked up at the Museum. To schedule a Docent-in-the-School visit or secure your CD-ROM resources inform the Education Department at the time you schedule your tour at 614.629.0359.
How to Schedule
Submit an on-line application to schedule your date, time and tour preference. Call Marybeth Kiser in the Education Department at 614.629.0359 or email marybeth.kiser@cmaohio.org if you have questions. You will need the following information to schedule your tour.
- Date and time
- Alternate dates and times
- Group size and grade level
- School or organization
- Tour topic
- Teacher or group leader's name
- Teacher's school and home telephone numbers
- Address of school or organization
- Special requests (handicap access, etc.)
- Request for Docent-in-the School and/or classroom resources to prepare students for their trip
A docent will call you at least one week before your visit to reconfirm the date, time, and content of the tour, and to determine a final count.
On the day of the tour, have students wear name tags. For self-guided and docent-led tours, one adult chaperone is required for every ten students (grades 1-8) throughout the Museum. Kindergarten groups should have one adult for every five children. In order to ensure a quality experience for the groups, chaperones are asked not to bring preschool aged children.
Be prompt! Plan to arrive 15 minutes before your scheduled tour time for check in and payment. Please turn in your fees at the Museum Drive information desk or the East Broad Street entrance.
Contact Marybeth Kiser at 614.629.0359 immediately if a cancellation or change in your reservation is necessary. Cancellations must be made at least one week prior to your scheduled tour or your school will be invoiced.
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Art Teaches - Stay current on learning opportunities available at the Columbus Museum of Art. Register now to receive quarterly electronic updates from the Columbus Museum of Art’s Education Department. |
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All docent tours must be booked by the 10th of the month prior to the month of your visit. Example: To book a group for October 4th, you need to schedule your docent tour by September 10th. Tours begin on the hour and will last 50 minutes. Please arrive and check in 15 minutes before your start time. The last tour will begin at 2:00 pm. The minimum number of students is 10. | |
| FOR TOURS IN | CALL BEFORE |
| October | September 10 |
| November | October 10 |
| December | November 10 |
| January | December 10 |
| February | January 10 |
| March | February 10 |
| April | March 10 |
| May | April 10 |
| June | May 10 |
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Some Simple Ideas to Prepare Students for a CMA Tour CMA tours are planned, and our docents are trained, to take advantage of visitors' prior knowledge. We use themes, key concepts, and essential questions to help facilitate these connections. We encourage you to use some advance organizers to provide students with prior knowledge that will work as building blocks for the construction of further knowledge, meaning and connection-making during their field trip. Two advance organizers, familiar to most of you, are Venn diagrams and webbing exercises.
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