Atlanta Museums are Educational Vacations

If you're visiting Atlanta for the summer, or live in the city and are looking for something new to do this summer, why not check out the great museums Atlanta has to offer? Whether you're into art or history, or are looking to plan a field trip that the kids will love, Atlanta has a museum that you'll definitely enjoy visiting.

The HIGH Museum of Art

The HIGH museum, Atlanta's premier art museum, features work from both new and established artists from all over the world. Photographers, painters, and sculptors all have beautiful featured work in the museum, making the HIGH a great place to explore for those who are interested in all kinds of art. The museum features art exhibits from a number of time periods, so choosing an exhibit that interests you shouldn't be a problem. Located in Atlanta's Midtown Business District, the museum is easy to find, and could be very affordable, depending on how many people you bring with you. Group adult rates are available, and scheduled tours are conducted weekly on Fridays and Saturdays at 2 p.m. The museum also has a café, so you can make a day out of your museum visit by order lunch on site. Currently, the featured exhibit is a collection of photographic works by artist Ernest C. Whithers, entitled The Memphis Blues Again. The exhibit is a collection of milestones in the African-American community that have been photographed, including pictures from the Civil Rights Movement, athletes from the Negro Baseball League, and musicians during the time of the birth of blues in Memphis. For more information on the museum or for reservation information, visit www.high.org.

Children's Museum of Atlanta

The Children's Museum of Atlanta is a great place to visit with your kids during the summer, if you're local; the exhibits are always changing, and there are always a number of fun and educational activities for children to engage in. Activities for the summer include shoe tying lessons for toddlers, dramatization of children's poems, and your children can even learn to make their own pop-up books. Regular exhibits include Fundamentally Food, an exhibit that teaches children how food can be used for both nutrition and art. Children will learn about how to grocery shop and plan recipes, as well as the shipping process for foods that come from all over the world. Tools for Solutions teaches children critical thinking skills, as well as math and science concepts; children learn how to plant their own gardens and about life under the soil, as well as how water is used to sustain life, and the properties of kinetic energy. Visit www.imagineit-cma.org for reservation information and museum hours.

In addition to these two major museums in Atlanta, there are also a number of historical centers in surrounding cities that you may want to visit when you're in town. The Roselawn Museum in Cartersville, Georgia is actually the Victorian mansion of former evangelist Samuel Porter Jones. Memorabilia from Rebecca Felton, the first female U.S. senator is also exhibited in the mansion. The Big Shanty Museum in Kennesaw, Georgia is home to Civil War and locomotive Memorabilia, and the tour includes a video presentation of the Great Locomotive Chase. If you want to buy tickets in advance, or get more information on other Atlanta Museums, visit sites like www.inusa.com and www.atlanta.net.