Planning a future visit? Check out our offerings below!

Take your students on an exciting exploration of the natural world. Our three floors of exhibits, ranging from dinosaurs and dioramas to hands-on interactive stations, are sure to make your field trip to the Academy the highlight of the school year.

Special Exhibits

Conversations With Birds

February 18–May 21, 2023

Opening in time for the 2023 spring migration, Conversations With Birds celebrates the many ways that we are inspired by these magnificent, feathered creatures, here in the city and around the world.

Discover the fascinating lives of local bird populations and the astounding migrators that fly through the region. Glimpse nest-cam footage of a peregrine falcon, and enjoy stunning avian photography and video by local birders and wildlife photographers.

Explore unique bird architecture and flight through hands-on activities. Investigate real-time migration data gathered from BirdCast, Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s forecast radar, and other innovative bird-tracking technology.

Learn about the challenges birds face in urban environments and how you can help protect them by creating bird-friendly habitats or advocating for bird-safe changes in your neighborhood.

Conversation With Birds is generously supported by the LTM Family Foundation and the Marshall-Reynolds Foundation.

Illuminating Birds

May 20–October 15, 2023

Part gallery and part studio, Illuminating Birds celebrates the enduring appeal of drawing and writing about birds. Requiring prolonged observation and deep curiosity, drawing — in its ability to distill — contributes to creative insights and scientific understanding.  

Experience avian artworks by Alexander Wilson, Elizabeth and John Gould, John James Audubon, Edward Lear and Louis Agassiz Fuertes from the Academy’s Library and Archives, all documenting the beginnings of the scientific study of birds — and the complex cultural and historical aspects that they carry. Examine colorful, early birding field guides and hand-painted magic lantern slides that demonstrate the role illustration played in popularizing birding and advancing the conservation movement.

In the Avian Art Studio, we invite you to try your own hand at drawing or writing about birds while surrounded by inspiring specimens, field notes, an extraordinary “commonplace book,” feathers and creative prompts developed by Drexel’s Writers Room and many others.

Over the course of the exhibition, avian artist-in-residence Jane Kim, whose work reflects current concerns related to biodiversity loss and climate change, will develop a new public mural for Philadelphia’s Fishtown neighborhood through a joint partnership of the Academy of Natural Sciences and Mural Arts Philadelphia. Follow along with us as the work unfolds!