Schools

The School Town Tour consists of a 1-hour program led by park staff or docents. Meet at the museum and we will discuss  Columbia and the Gold Rush. Miners came from around the world using several routes. Learn how they made their living in Columbia and effects of water and fire on the gold rush town. Included in the tour is hands on mining demonstration, a talk on general mercantilism, and weather permitting, a bucket brigade.

These two programs can be done alone or together to create a comprehensible Gold Rush field trip depending on time constraints and interest. There are 15 minutes between each hour program to go to your next tour.  Programs are NOT available the THIRD week in May due to Diggins Tent Town event.

For more information or assistance please email Columbiaschoolliaison@gmail.com

The cost is $35 per tour.

This is a unique living history program offered during select Thursdays each spring. This program requires a one-hour online lesson with distance learning interpreter, Caleb Masquelier. We will contact you once you are registered to schedule the online lesson. A teacher’s guide is provided with a series of required in-class programs and activities led by the teacher. The teacher will divide the classes into companies before the field trip, so the students arrive at the park prepared for their Gold Trek. Each time slot can accommodate 35 students, divided into companies of 7 each.

When they arrive at the park, the students participate as “companies” in an auction where they have the opportunity to spend or save their money, purchase maps, carts, supplies, and shovels, and start on their journey. Along the route to the gold fields, they encounter charlatans, merchants, ferry crossings, and opportunities to make critical decisions that affect their ability to arrive at the diggins ready to work.

Gold Trek is meant to replicate the experience that many gold seekers faced as they traveled from Stockton to the diggings in search of gold.

This program requires a one-hour online pre-lesson with park’s distance learning interpreter. The pre-lesson is offered in January and February to introduce students to the Gold Rush so they will be better prepared for the Gold Trek and can have a more enriching experience. The lesson covers historical Gold Rush history, Columbia’s town history, routes of travel, and information about the trek from the Port of Stockton to Columbia. The lesson is approximately ½ hour long. Contact Caleb Masquelier at Caleb.Masquelier@parks.ca.gov

WAITLIST: If you are unable to make reservations for this program because the timeslot is full, please send an email to SchoolGroups with your name, school name, # of students, and phone number to be added to our waitlist. If we have additional spots available or receive a cancellation, we will contact you.

2022 Program Information

New for 2022! Homeschool Option

Homeschool programs will now have a Gold Trek program tailored to them. There will be 2 start times with a minimum of 7 students from third grade through eighth grade. Several different homeschools will participate in the trek at the same timeslot.

Each year, docents and staff recreate an early tent town to demonstrate the daily life of Gold Rush mining camps. Educational programs for 4th graders are offered on the Thursday and Friday of Columbia Diggins Tent Town. Students get a chance to tour the camp and interact with characters from 1852.

This program adheres to the state’s curriculum standards, and provides an unbeatable opportunity for students to experience first-hand what they’ve learned in the classroom. This program is very popular and reservations are required.

We are full for 2022,   We will no longer be accepting reservations, or changing any reservations to different days or times.  To preserve the learning environment, classes without reservations are not admitted on Thursday or Friday of the event.  The cost is $7/student, which includes $5 worth of “Columbia Eagles” which are redeemed for goods, food or services in the camp, giving students an opportunity to interact in the mercantile economy of the camp.

WAITLIST: The waitlist is closed  we are full and the Park is now scheduling the tours.  We will not be making any changes. 

• PORTS – Full for 2022.  Columbia SHP is a host site for the Parks Online Resources for Teachers and Students Program, or PORTS. This program uses videoconference technology to link students to park personnel and the California gold rush. It introduces California content standards in a fun and interactive way. Click here for a direct link, or go to school programs for a better overview offered by the California State Parks.

• Passports -Columbia’s Passports  is a self-guided touring aid where students are required to find, identify and list items found in locations throughout the park. It’s a treasure hunt of information where they learn firsthand about details of the mining days. It meets the California State Curriculum Standards for fourth grade social studies content.
Passports can be purchased for $1.25 each in the museum or ordered in advance of your school trip by clicking HERE  to download and print a Passport order form. Due to high demand for the Passports, prepaid orders are filled first and no orders are shipped without prepayment

Registration opens October 20, 2021 at 3:30 pm.