Art Museum brings the museum experience to schools

Oct. 31, 2025

A man kneels to talk to a group of students sitting on a gym floor with paper booklets.

Springfield Public Schools fifth grade trips to the Springfield Art Museum are a longstanding tradition that not even major construction could cancel, as museum staff visit every elementary school in the district.

For years, students would take a trip to the Springfield Art Museum in their fifth-grade year as a part of the Any Given Child Community experiences. However, with the museum undertaking major renovation, the schools and the team at the museum had to get crafty: instead of taking the fifth graders to the museum, they brought the museum to the fifth graders.

“When we were conducting pre-closure interviews, surveys and meetings, finding some way to keep the museum's fifth grade field trip program going was repeated by many stakeholders,” said Joshua Best, Springfield Art Museum educator. “When the Museum was founded almost 100 years ago, there was no place for the community to gather and view art together. Now, we are fortunate to live in a community and region with a strong arts community, but the Springfield Art Museum remains a key hub for the community to gather through the arts. Going ‘dark’ during our expansion and renovation project was never an option for us.”

A man stands in front of a group of students in a library.

Art museum staff and volunteers have gone out to visit each SPS elementary school to teach the students about art, culture and the museum's work in the Springfield community. These presentations help students make connections to the 3-D drawing and painting classes they’re taking, and reinforce their visual art essential learning standards.

“The discussions that develop from the students' thoughts run the gamut from common shared experiences across school sites to wildly unique interpretations,” said Best. “It really drives home the usefulness of art objects as conversation starters.”

At each visit, students cycled through four stations, each featuring a different piece of art:

Nick Cave’s Soundsuit
A Japanese Wedding kimono with crane motif
An untitled drawing by Rose O’Neill
Roger Shimomura’s An American Enemy

A woman stands in front of students in a library, next to a large photo of an art piece. She holds a drawing of the art. A woman in a blue kimono stands in front of students, next to a large photo of another more intricate kimono. A boy holds papers as he looks at a Kewpie doll in a box. A woman stands in front of a group of students, next to a large image of a painting of a man in military uniform.

These four stations focused on dialogue, close-looking and observation, interpretation skills and visual thinking strategies. Three of the four stations also featured artwork with a focus on Missouri and regional artists. Each student could further interact with the piece they were being taught about in the workbook provided to them.