SCHOOL EVENTS and FESTIVALS

Are your students curious and love hands-on learning? Join us for a day of innovation as we travel from the past, to the present and look into the future to explore the history, technology and innovations of Indiana through community exhibitors, interactive activities and design challenges. Students will use their imagination to tinker, make, create, invent and play!

There is limited space so register early. Only Indiana Innovation Day-related field trips offered during this time. No self-guided field trips available.

Bring your students to explore Paleozoic seas, discover mysteries in Ice Age caves, test their knowledge of Indiana’s geology and investigate the world under their feet. Hands-on activities and million-year-old specimens in our galleries help illustrate Indiana’s geological past. Shopping for gems, fossils and minerals from around the globe is available.

Students will connect to the museum on a deeper level as they interact with hands-on, minds-on activities throughout the museum on these special STEAM Days. The galleries will have activities spread throughout all three levels to tinker and discover Indiana’s connections to science, technology, engineering, art and math. Look for a special bonus outside the Education Center for a design challenge that will have your students creating prototypes to solve a real-world challenge.

There is limited space so register early! Only STEAM-related field trips are offered during this time. No self-guided field trips available on these days.

On your mark, get set … for the second-greatest spectacle in racing! The Indiana State Museum and Scouting America invite you to build and race Pinewood Derby cars down the two-story, 125-foot racetrack and watch them speed across the finish line!

Innovative Hoosier students are invited to get involved in becoming the solution to global climate issues. Students can submit science challenge projects on a range of topics including aquaculture, vermiculture, composting, social awareness, urban farming, alternative energy and recycling initiatives in their schools and communities. Monetary prizes will be awarded to the schools of the winning students to assist in continuing eco-science-related work. Application deadline is April 3, 2026.