School Programs

Learning Opportunities

Partner with Shelburne Farms and bring your curriculum to life using food, farming, and the natural world. Together, we’ll engage your students in inquiry-based experiential learning with lasting positive impact.

On our farm
Our 1,400-acre working farm and forest is a living classroom. Dive into the natural world, food systems, and agriculture. Typical program length is 2–4 hours, September–June, with all programming outdoors. $4–$8/student, scholarships available. From May–Oct., consider a self-guided visit to our Children’s Farmyard!

In your school or community
We’ll come to your schoolyard, garden, local natural area, or community for a program customized for your place. Offered September–June. $2 per student per hour, plus mileage to and from site.

Collaborative support for teams and schools
We’re eager to work with schools and school districts to offer custom professional learning and build rich curricula over the span of a semester or school year. Request information about professional learning collaborations.

Financial Support

We’re committed to making transformative learning experiences accessible to all. If you need financial support, contact us at school.programs@shelburnefarms.org

Sample Programs

We use our farm campus, and the Big Ideas of Sustainability, to explore the natural world and connect students to where their food and fiber comes from. Sample school programs listed below can be adapted for grades K–8, September–June. PreK and Kindergarten groups are also welcome to reach out via our request form for Farm Animal Visits (see description below).

Agricultural and Food Systems programs

Enrich your farm to school connections by getting direct experience with where foods and fibers come from. We’ll make learning come to life by using hands-on activities to engage with these vital systems. Note that offerings vary depending on the season.
 

• Garden Pizza Party: Students discover the key role farms play in our lives and the many gifts the Land provides. Get hands-on with veggies from the garden, mix up dough from grain, and create cheese from milk to collaboratively make pizza (Fall).
   
• Farm to You: Students discover the key role farms play in our lives and the many gifts the Land provides. Get hands-on with materials directly from the Land. Activities may include making bread and butter from scratch or creating items with wool from our sheep (Early Winter).
   
• Sugaring Time: Investigate the science and wonder behind maple sugaring. Follow the process from tapping to tasting. Students will engage in the full cycle of sugaring from tapping a sugar maple tree to gathering sap, and will visit the sugar maker in the sugar house (Late Winter and Early Spring).
   
• Spring on the Farm: Explore a Vermont dairy farm. Visit our herd of Brown Swiss cows and see the milking parlor, feed alley, and even the manure pit! Milk a cow and learn about the roles cows play in our agriculture system. Then, meet and interact with lambs and ewes while exploring the importance of wool through washing, drying, spinning, and carding (Spring). Educators interested in more in-depth dairy programming, sign up to access our digital Dairy in the Classroom resources.
   
• Classroom Farm Animal Visit (PreK and Kindergarten groups only): One of our farm-based educators will visit your classroom with a Shelburne Farms chicken or angora rabbit. Explore topics such as life cycles, adaptations, and food and fiber (Winter). Visits are 30–45 minutes long and take place in your school or center.
   

Natural World Exploration programs

Get outside in any season to explore the Land. Forests and water are diverse, dynamic, and important parts of our ecosystems; what we discover will be emergent depending on place and time of year.
 

• Forest Investigation: We’ll become nature detectives as we examine the changing landscape. Search for life in the forest – in trees, in the soil, and under logs (Fall and Spring).
   
• Active in Winter: Investigate Shelburne Farms, your community, or your schoolyard for signs of active animals in winter. Examine the adaptations and strategies Vermont animals use to survive winter. Develop track identification and observational skills to become a winter wildlife detective (Winter). For grades 5–8, this program is three hours long and takes place entirely outdoors.
   
• Pond and Forest Life Cycles & Adaptations: Explore pond and forest ecosystems. Experience seasons at the pond and in the forest by investigating insect and amphibian life cycles. Discover how creatures adapt to eating, moving, and surviving in their watery and forest-y worlds! (Fall and Spring)
   
• Geology Rocks: Explore the geologic processes that have shaped and transformed our earth, including rock formation and weathering. Examine the rich geologic history of our region through hands-on activities designed to explore change over time in natural cycles (Fall and Spring). Recommended for grades 3–8. This program is two hours long and takes place entirely outdoors.