Dyche Hall
1345 Jayhawk Blvd.
Lawrence, KS 66045
785.864.4450
In my life BC (before children), I taught elementary school. Each year we would take our second graders to the KU Natural History Museum for a field trip. I hadn’t thought of taking my girls there for an outing, but when a friend suggested we go, it sounded like a great idea.
If you haven’t been to Lawrence in a while (or ever) it is actually closer than you might think. It’s only about an hour’s drive from downtown KC. We decided to make a day out of our trip and first visited the Lawrence Nature Sanctuary. It was a wet and chilly day, so we spent about an hour seeing animals in the Nature Center building. We then loaded up the van and made our way over to KU. We brought our lunch with us and went to the student center and ate our lunch in the cafeteria. Bellies full, we made our way over to the museum.
Four floors await your exploration. All the kids really enjoyed the enormous panorama of animals and plants that welcomed us to the museum and had a great time trying to find all of the different animals. My oldest was mesmerized with the display of the horse, Comanche. The museum details how the horse was preserved and my daughter found the process to be mighty cool. We spent quite a bit of time in Bug Town, an interactive area for kids where they can explore what it is like to be an insect (and see some insects close up!). Save time for a visit to the top floor where they house many live animals. There were lots of “ohhs” and “ahhs” as the kids ran from one tank to the next to view the fish and snakes.
There is no set admission to the museum, but donations are accepted and appreciated. I didn’t do my homework before our visit to find the great scavenger hunt they have available for you to use during your visit. Next trip I will definitely print it up and bring it with us.