Mini van parked in front of the large glass museum entrance. Van features the image of a sabercat fossil along its side.

Educational Outreach

The South Carolina State Museum is on the move bringing fun-filled learning experiences across the state and beyond!

AstroSphere Information

The AstroSphere Portable Planetarium is an inflatable dome with a portable star projector that transports you and your students through the solar system and beyond! Please see the information below to learn more about the program, standards, room requirements, and more!

Standards to build upon:
- 2021 SC College and Career Ready Standards: 1-ESS1-1, 1-ESS1-2; 5-ESS1-1, 5-ESS1-2
- NGSS: 1-ESS1-1, 1-ESS1-2; 5-ESS1-1, 5-ESS1-2
Educator-led programs are 45 minutes long, blocked in 1 hour time periods to allow for proper resetting and safe entering and exiting of the dome.  Please note: A maximum of four, 1-hr programs can be done in a single day.
General Sky Tour Curriculum will take you and your students on a celestial journey covering a variety of topics that may include: basic navigation star colors/brightness, constellations, asterisms, Earth's rotation and axis tilt, a brief viewing of the solar system or the Moon if time allows. We are happy to make minor customizations upon request.

Schedule & Room Requirements:

AstroSphere bookings are available Tuesdays-Fridays.
Please keep travel time in mind when creating your schedule, as educators are not able to leave the museum before 6:30am.
A totally silent space is required. The portable dome must be completely isolated from all other noise and activity. It should be the only thing happening in the room at any given time. No sound or other activities can be in the room while programs are going on. We are also unable to break down and reset the dome within a single day.
An indoor location must be chosen as we cannot safely set up the dome indoors. We are also unable to set up the dome on a stage for safety reasons.
Capacity: 25 smaller students (3rd grade and below) can fit in the dome at once. About 20 older students can fit in the dome at one time. The bigger they get, the tighter the space.
Room Requirements: 24ft of cleared floor space and 10.5ft ceiling clearance (including light fixtures or anything else that may be hanging down) is required. We will need two accessible, working outlets to inflate the dome and run the projection system.
If your school uses internet/wifi blockers we will need a way to bypass that system. Please notify us of this ahead of time so we can properly present and our staff can properly communicate with us if needed.