Potential school visit

Thank you for your interest in visiting The Bug Parc with your school group.

Our Parc is a unique all-invertebrate tropical zoo set in a five-acre purpose-built facility with free parking for cars and coaches.

Over 200 tropical insect displays are housed in three large visitor houses named after well-known entomologists of the past. Kirby House, Comstock House, and Hinton House.

Most school visits are from 10am to 2pm and our itineraries are based on those hours, though we can open earlier if required and schools can stay later than 2pm if it preferred. (itineraries can be changed to accommodate any length of visit).

We close at 4pm winter hours, at 5pm summer hours.

School visits are broken down into smaller groups of 15 to 25 children, dependent on the number of children visiting on the day, and we provide a colour-coded itinerary for each group for the day to make your visit run like clockwork.

Itinerary Example

Here is an example of an itinerary that would suit the number of children proposed for a visit for two groups. The itineraries are based on an experience of past visits but can be changed to accommodate the specific needs of a school.

Times	Group 1	Group 2
10:00 or before	Arrival	Arrival
10:00 to 10:30	Ant talk & Q&A Comstock House	Talk Hinton House
10:30 to 11:00	Butterfly House Visit	Ant talk & Q&A Comstock House
11:00 to 11:30	Handling Insects Handling Room	Talk Kirby House
11:30 to 12:00	Handling Insects Handling Room	Butterfly House Visit
12:00 to 12:30	Lunch Undercover Area or Outside	Lunch Undercover Area or Outside
12:30 to 13:00	Talk Kirby House	Outside play or Hinton House
13:00 to 13:30	Outside play or Hinton House	Handling Insects Handling Room
13:30 to 14:00	Talk Hinton House	Handling Insects Handling Room
14:10 or after	Departure	Departure

Times	Group 1
10:00 or before	Arrival
10:00 to 10:30	Ant talk & Q&A Comstock House
10:30 to 11:00	Butterfly House Visit
11:00 to 11:30	Handling Insects Handling Room
11:30 to 12:00	Handling Insects Handling Room
12:00 to 12:30	Lunch Undercover Area or Outside
12:30 to 13:00	Talk Kirby House
13:00 to 13:30	Outside play or Hinton House
13:30 to 14:00	Talk Hinton House
14:10 or after	Departure

Times	Group 2
10:00 or before	Arrival
10:00 to 10:30	Talk Hinton House
10:30 to 11:00	Ant talk & Q&A Comstock House
11:00 to 11:30	Talk Kirby House
11:30 to 12:00	Butterfly House Visit
12:00 to 12:30	Lunch Undercover Area or Outside
12:30 to 13:00	Outside play or Hinton House
13:00 to 13:30	Handling Insects Handling Room
13:30 to 14:00	Handling Insects Handling Room
14:10 or after	Departure

Group 1 Group 2

Our tropical houses in detail

Handling insects

Each group will have a timed handling session lasting approximately 45 minutes to enable each child (if they wish to) to handle four or five safe-to-handle invertebrates, whilst the keepers explain a little about each species, and they will also answer questions from the group. The group will then be shown a tarantula and/or scorpion up close but these animals will not be handled.

Lunch

We split the lunch breaks into half-hour slots so that each group can take their packed lunches into our covered area, next to the butterfly house, which will be closed off specifically for the school visiting. On nicer days, there are plenty of outside picnic benches where children can have their packed lunches en plein air. We can supply lunch/sandwiches by prior request.

Talks

We can give several talks in different houses by request whilst visiting other houses.

We include a detailed talk about our leaf-cutting ant colony, talking about social insects, their life, habitat, and daily life.
We include a talk in Kirby House about our butterfly chrysalis hatching, scorpions, whip scorpions and beetles.
We include a talk in Hinton House about orthoptera, mantis, snails and mantis.
Full Q&A session available at the end of the talk.

Outside Play

Should the weather be suitable, there are a range of fun activities outside that are available to each group in allocated time slots in the itinerary.

Pedal cars on a contained track
Undercover sand pit
Jumping pillow (limit 28 persons on the pillow at a time)
Outside play area with swings, a slide, and a climbing frame
Large grassed area to run around and with picnic tables for outside lunches

Wall information boards

The wall boards in each room are very comprehensive and can be used as an aid to discuss most topics in the school curriculum that relate to invertebrates.

Other information

We are predominantly an undercover attraction, so visits will not be spoiled by bad weather, though the outside play activities would then be limited.

You are welcome to have a school representative visit the Parc as our guest to assess the Parc and plan the school visit day in advance.

Pricing

Price per child£9.00 (inc VAT)
Registered carersFree

One free teacher for each group, or part group of 10 children. Extra teachers/helpers are charged at £9.00pp (inc VAT). We will send the invoice to the school after the visit.

Booking

Should you wish to book a visit please contact Martin French, Director, by email at martin@thebugparc.com. Please confirm a date or dates that you would prefer for your visit and advise how many children you would wish to bring to the Parc. We will then check that the date(s) is/are available and advise accordingly.

Additional Information

Once we have confirmed the booking we will provide you with a full risk assessment for the site, insurance information, a full itinerary for the number of groups attending and a site plan.

We look forward to your visit. Should you have any further questions, please do not hesitate to contact us by email at martin@thebugparc.com

School trips and educational visits