Half-Day School Field Trips in Toronto's High Park
Have your students join us in Toronto’s High Park for an engaging, outdoor experience and learn about different ecosystems, soils, animal shelters or history!
Registration for our field trip programs in High Park during the 2026-27 school year is OPEN!
From September to December 2026, school field trips will meet at the High Park Forest School on 375 Colborne Lodge Drive.
2027 school field trips will meet at either the High Park Forest School on 375 Colborne Lodge Drive or the Cottage on 440 Parkside Dr. Please check our How To Get Here webpage to know the correct location for your group.
Starting September 2025, all our school field trips will be meeting at the HPNC Cottage on 440 Parkside Drive.
Please review our updated cancellation and rescheduling policy for field trips for the 2025-26 school year.
We are now accepting applications for our School Field Trip Bursary Program for the 2026-2027 school year.
Our school field trips allow students to participate in a variety of hands-on programs, including learning about animal shelters and their architects, the globally rare Black Oak Savannah, the importance of soil, the water bodies of High Park, the history of the land where the park is situated, and lots more!
Field trips will include a hike, lively discussion, fun activities, and games to get students thinking, caring, and learning about the natural world all around us that we are part of!
We believe the best place to learn about nature is in nature! Our programs take place almost exclusively outdoors. We have indoor washrooms and cloakroom for students to store their belongings.
Please read through our program themes for the season and additional details provided below.
Can’t find a spot available for your preferred date? Join our waitlist by filling out our waitlist form. We will get back to you if and when a spot opens up.
2026/2027 Program Themes
Sensing Fall: Preschool/Kindergarten
Warm up your five senses and go on a hands-on, sensory nature hike through High Park’s woodlands and Black Oak Savannah. Students will use tools like hand-lenses to explore what the fall season looks like, sounds like and feels like. Through songs and games, they will learn about amazing animal senses and how those abilities help animals prepare for the winter.
Fall Into Winter: Grades 1-3
As the temperature drops and days become shorter, the plants and animals of High Park prepare for winter in many fascinating ways! Participants will learn who migrates, who hibernates and who has amazing adaptations that allow them to stay put and survive a Canadian winter.
Keep On Trackin’: Grades 4-6
Living in a city can make it hard to see our animal neighbors – but they leave clues behind! Students will tune into their senses to learn about different kinds of animal “tracks”: from bird calls and animal nests to footprints on the ground! They will also learn about how animals’ adaptations allow them to survive and thrive in the big city!
Know Your Forest: Grades 7-8
Learn about the fascinating forest regions Toronto straddles and how Toronto’s forests differ from the rest of Ontario! Students will head out into the forest and savannah to learn how to identify trees based on leaf (or bud) and seed shape, and use math in a simple, practical, and hands-on way to age various trees in High Park.
I Live In A Watershed: Grades 9-12
We all live in a watershed. Water is life and yet we often do not think about the importance or role humans play in water stewardship. Through investigating historical and current watershed maps, hiking to some of the nine bodies of water in High Park and learning about the diversity of life that live in High Parks wetland complex students will form a deeper understanding of the importance of protecting Toronto’s watershed systems.
How Place Holds Time: Grades 9-12
On this field trip, students will work together to build a two-dimensional timeline that captures the deep history of High Park including Indigenous presence, occupation, and their legacy of Stewardship of this Land. On a hike through the park, students will connect events from the timeline with the landscape they can see around them in real life!
Over And Under The Snow: Preschool/Kindergarten
Learn about the fascinating winter world taking place under the snow, look for animal tracks in the park and learn how animals and plants survive a Toronto winter through songs, rhymes and an exploratory hike.
Fall Into Winter: Grades 1-3
As the temperature drops and days become shorter, the plants and animals of High Park prepare for winter in many fascinating ways! Participants will learn who migrates, who hibernates and who has amazing adaptations that allow them to stay put and survive a Canadian winter.
Keep On Trackin’: Grades 1-6
Living in a city can make it hard to see our animal neighbors – but they leave clues behind! Students will tune into their senses to learn about different kinds of animal “tracks”: from bird calls and animal nests to footprints on the ground! They will also learn about how animals’ adaptations allow them to survive and thrive in the big city!
Urban Biodiversity: Grades 7-8
Students will explore the amazing biodiversity of Toronto’s flora and fauna. Students will gain insight into the roles critters and plants play in an urban ecosystem with a trivia game through the forest. They will explore the animal architects that shape the park and play a food web predator and prey game.
How Place Holds Time: Grades 9-12
On this field trip, students will work together to build a two-dimensional timeline that captures the deep history of High Park including Indigenous presence, occupation, and their legacy of Stewardship of this Land. On a hike through the park, students will connect events from the timeline with the landscape they can see around them in real life!
Signs Of Spring: Preschool/Kindergarten
Celebrate the awakening of spring in High Park through your senses! Students will search for signs of spring: hungry hibernators waking up, migrating birds returning to nest, and the earliest of plants and the rainbows of colour returning to High Park on this imaginative hike program.
Buds And Butterflies: Grades 1-3 (best from May onwards)
Find out why bugs are some of our favourite animals and all they do for the planet! Explore the lifecycle of a butterfly and learn about native wildflowers and plants that attract these animals to High Park. Each student will plant a native plant or create a seed ball to help feed our butterflies and help increase habitats for all bugs. If there is sun, we will look for butterflies, if there is rain, we will look for butterflies’ buddies, the decomposers.
Marvellous Mud: Grades 1-3
Explore the muddy world beneath your feet! Discover the “recipe” for dirt and learn about which animals help to create it. Students will mix soil and water to make mud, look for mud on the trails and around wetlands and play games to learn about the importance of soil in the food chain.
Keep On Trackin’: Grades 4-6
Living in a city can make it hard to see our animal neighbors – but they leave clues behind! Students will tune into their senses to learn about different kinds of animal “tracks”: from bird calls and animal nests to footprints on the ground! They will also learn about how animals’ adaptations allow them to survive and thrive in the big city!
Migration Celebration: Grades 4-6 (best from May onwards)
Learn about the incredible feats of migration as birds return from their wintering grounds to nest in Canadian forests. Discover why High Park is an important natural area for spring migrants, go on a bird-watching hike, and play bird identification games.
Urban Biodiversity: Grades 7-8
Students will explore the amazing biodiversity of Toronto’s flora and fauna. Students will gain insight into the roles critters and plants play in an urban ecosystem with a trivia game through the forest. They will explore the animal architects that shape the park and play a food web predator and prey game.
I Live In A Watershed: Grades 9-12
We all live in a watershed. Water is life and yet we often do not think about the importance or role humans play in water stewardship. Through investigating historical and current watershed maps, hiking to some of the nine bodies of water in High Park and learning about the diversity of life that live in High Parks wetland complex students will form a deeper understanding of the importance of protecting Toronto’s watershed systems.
How Place Holds Time: Grades 9-12
On this field trip, students will work together to build a two-dimensional timeline that captures the deep history of High Park including Indigenous presence, occupation, and their legacy of Stewardship of this Land. On a hike through the park, students will connect events from the timeline with the landscape they can see around them in real life!
More Information
2026 location:
NOTE: Our school field trips in 2026 will be meeting at the High Park Forest School on 375 Colborne Lodge Drive.
Our field trip programs will meet outside the High Park Nature Centre’s Forest School building located at 375 Colborne Lodge Drive. It is located close to the North Gates of High Park and is a 5-minute walk from the High Park Subway Station.
School buses can enter the park via the Parkside Drive entrance, then drive up Colborne Lodge Drive to drop kids off outside the Nature Centre.
2027 location:
High Park Nature Centre has two buildings in High Park: the Forest School at 375 Colborne Lodge Drive and the Cottage at 440 Parkside Drive. One building, the Forest School, is slated for renovation in 2027. Depending on when the renovation begins, field trips may be held at the Forest School or at the Cottage.
Please check our How To Get Here webpage to determine which building you will be meeting at. The information at this link will be updated regularly through the 2026-27 school year to give you the current accurate location for your field trip.
Program Length
- Our field trips typically run for 2 hours
Note: Preschool programs are 1.5 hours long. K-12 programs run for 2 hours.
Weekly availability
School programs are available Monday – Friday throughout the week. To see the list of available dates please refer to our booking page.
- Morning field trips run 9:30 – 11:30AM or 10AM – 12PM
- Afternoon field trips run 12:30 – 2:30PM or 1-3PM
- $350 for one class (up to 30 student participants) additional students from the same class may join the field trip at a cost of $12 per student.
- For classes over 39 students, please contact us directly to confirm if we can accommodate a large class. We will reach out to you once we have reviewed your booking request.
Note: Our Registration Policies and associated cancellation policies apply to our school field trips. Please read carefully when booking your field trip.
Our School Field Trip Bursary Program is open for the 2026-2027 school year.
We believe everyone should experience nature. Through our School Field Trip Bursary Program, we strive to make our programs accessible for school groups while also balancing the costs for staffing, administration and the program. We provide meaningful nature-focused experiences in High Park’s natural habitats in small groups (15 students per facilitator). Keeping our ratios low allows our instructors to engage more closely with participants and minimizes the impact of our programs on the park’s natural environment.
To apply for a School Field Trip Bursary:
- Complete our Field Trip Bursary application form here.
- We will get back to you after your application has been reviewed to let you know if your bursary is confirmed.
- If your bursary is confirmed, we will send you details about how to register for a program. We reserve a certain number of spots for bursary programs.
We use the TDSB Learning Opportunities Index to help determine if a school qualifies for a bursary. Elementary schools ranked in the Top 300 or High Schools in the top 30 on TDSB’s LOI Index may qualify. We also use additional supporting information provided in the application that demonstrates the school’s need for a bursary-supported program. For non-TDSB schools we take your supporting information into account as well as your school location. when making our decision.
We can accommodate up to 30 students in a class (plus up to 6 adult teachers/volunteers). For more than 30 students, there will be an additional cost of $12 per extra student. If you indicate more than 39 students, please email us directly to confirm if this is possible. We will reach out to you once we have reviewed your booking request.
Note: Smaller group sizes means greater connectivity and better learning. We encourage different classes to book trips separately to maximize the experience for students.
It’s important to be prepared for all-weather outdoor activities. Here are items and clothing to bring to the High Park Nature Centre:
- Reusable water bottle
- Weather-appropriate clothing (e.g. Waterproof pants and coats when rain is expected)
- Closed-toe, weather-appropriate shoes
- Note: Closed-toe shoes protect from insect bites (red ants) and poison ivy.
- Clean face mask (optional)
- Nut-free, litterless snacks (optional)
- Note: The High Park Nature Centre is a nut-free zone.
Teachers are expected to take an active role in managing the behaviours of their students. Read more about our behaviour policy by visiting our registration policy page.
The High Park Nature Centre promotes awareness and respect for nature through year-round, hands-on outdoor nature education and park stewardship activities. We strongly believe that an important part of connecting with nature involves responsible, active outdoor play.
At Nature Centre programs, we engage in activities such as exploring in soil, hiking in the forest, and balancing on logs. These activities can often result in kids getting their hands, legs or clothes dirty! Our leaders prioritize safety by establishing clear guidelines with all participants and supervising activities.
If you have questions or would like to learn more about active outdoor play, please talk with us.
- Early cancellation or rescheduling: If you cancel or reschedule your visit 14 or more days before your program date you will not be charged a late fee.
- Late cancellation: If you cancel your visit less than 14 days before your program date you will be charged the full program fee.
- Late rescheduling: If you reschedule your visit less than 14 days before your program date you will be charged a $50 administrative fee.
- Late cancellation and rescheduling fees are not waived for inclement weather or missed days.
NOTE: If you are unable to attend your booked visit, please provide us with as much advance notice as possible. This greatly assists us in scheduling and allows us to offer the spot to another group in a timely manner.
Can’t find a spot available for your preferred date? Join our waitlist by filling out our waitlist form. We will get back to you if and when a spot opens up.
More Information
NOTE: Starting September 2025, all our school field trips will be meeting at the HPNC Cottage on 440 Parkside Drive.
Until June 30, 2025, all in-person field trip programs will meet outside the High Park Nature Centre located at 375 Colborne Lodge Drive. We are located at the North Entrance to the park. It is a 5-minute walk from the High Park Subway Station.
School buses can enter the park via the Parkside Drive entrance, then drive up Colborne Lodge Drive to drop kids off outside the Nature Centre.
NOTE: TTC is piloting a field trip transit program where they will reimburse transit for Grades 7-12 student field trips during the 2024-2025 school year. Visit TTC’s website to learn more.
Program Length
- Our field trips typically run for 2 hours
Note: Preschool programs are 1.5 hours long. K-12 programs run for 2 hours.
Weekly availability
School programs are available Monday – Friday throughout the week. To see the list of available dates please refer to our booking page.
- Morning field trips run 9:30 – 11:30AM or 10AM – 12PM
- Afternoon field trips run 12:30 – 2:30PM or 1-3PM
- $325/class (30 students): 2-hour field trip
- For classes over 30 students, please contact us directly to confirm if this can be accommodated. Additional fees may apply. We will reach out to you once we have reviewed your application about any additional costs.
Note: Our Registration Policies and associated cancellation policies apply to our school field trips. Please read carefully when booking your field trip.
Our School Field Trip Bursary Program is open for the 2025-2026 school year.
We believe everyone should experience nature. Through our School Field Trip Bursary Program, we strive to make our programs accessible for school groups while also balancing the costs for staffing, administration and the program. We provide meaningful nature-focused experiences in High Park’s natural habitats in small groups (15 students per facilitator). Keeping our ratios low allows our instructors to engage more closely with participants and minimizes the impact of our programs on the park’s natural environment.
To apply for a School Field Trip Bursary:
- Complete our Field Trip Bursary application form here.
- We will get back to you after your application has been reviewed to let you know if your bursary is confirmed.
- If your bursary is confirmed, we will send you details about how to register for a program. We reserve a certain number of spots for bursary programs.
We use the TDSB Learning Opportunities Index to help determine if a school qualifies for a bursary. Elementary schools ranked in the Top 300 or High Schools in the top 30 on TDSB’s LOI Index may qualify. We also use additional supporting information provided in the application that demonstrates the school’s need for a bursary-supported program. For non-TDSB schools we take your supporting information into account as well as your school location. when making our decision.
We can accommodate up to 30 students in a class (plus up to 6 adult teachers/volunteers). For more than 30 students, there will be an additional class fee, and we’ll need to assess if we have additional staff available to teach. If you indicate more than 30, please email us directly to confirm if this is possible.
Note: Smaller group sizes means greater connectivity and better learning. We encourage different classes to book trips separately to maximize the experience for students.
It’s important to be prepared for all-weather outdoor activities. Here are items and clothing to bring to the High Park Nature Centre:
- Reusable water bottle
- Weather-appropriate clothing (e.g. Waterproof pants and coats when rain is expected)
- Closed-toe, weather-appropriate shoes
- Note: Closed-toe shoes protect from insect bites (red ants) and poison ivy.
- Clean face mask (optional)
- Nut-free, litterless snacks (optional)
- Note: The High Park Nature Centre is a nut-free zone.
Teachers are expected to take an active role in managing the behaviours of their students. Read more about our behaviour policy by visiting our registration policy page.
The High Park Nature Centre promotes awareness and respect for nature through year-round, hands-on outdoor nature education and park stewardship activities. We strongly believe that an important part of connecting with nature involves responsible, active outdoor play.
At Nature Centre programs, we engage in activities such as exploring in soil, hiking in the forest, and balancing on logs. These activities can often result in kids getting their hands, legs or clothes dirty! Our leaders prioritize safety by establishing clear guidelines with all participants and supervising activities.
If you have questions or would like to learn more about active outdoor play, please talk with us.
- Early cancellation or rescheduling: If you cancel or reschedule your visit 14 or more days before your program date you will not be charged a late fee.
- Late cancellation: If you cancel your visit less than 14 days before your program date you will be charged the full program fee.
- Late rescheduling: If you reschedule your visit less than 14 days before your program date you will be charged a $50 administrative fee.
- Late cancellation and rescheduling fees are not waived for inclement weather or missed days.
NOTE: If you are unable to attend your booked visit, please provide us with as much advance notice as possible. This greatly assists us in scheduling and allows us to offer the spot to another group in a timely manner.
Can’t find a spot available for your preferred date? Join our waitlist by filling out our waitlist form. We will get back to you if and when a spot opens up.
Our Field Trip Bursary Program makes our programs accessible for school groups while balancing the costs for staffing, administration and programming. We use the TDSB Learning Opportunities Index, and use additional supporting information provided in the application to help determine if a school qualifies for a bursary.
Registration Policies
- General Cancellation Policy
- Extreme Weather-Related Cancellation Policy
- Behaviour Policy
Thank You To Our Sponsors
Our School Field Trip Bursary Program is made possible thanks to funding from the Rotary Club of Parkdale, High Park and Humber. We are grateful for their support of our school programs in High Park.
