Educational City Breaks

Your kids might balk at the idea, and so might your partner, but for some a holiday is the perfect way to see history in action. For the best holidays that combine leisure pursuits with educational worth, you need to head towards the major centres of European history. Cities like Rome, Edinburgh, London and Paris are great destinations for an educational holiday which will be exciting and informative. The best educational breaks combine an interesting focus on history, great and relatively cheap access to museums and a strong local interest in the city. Cities which wear their history on their sleeve and offer discounts on museum entry are the ones to look out for, particularly, if you are travelling as a large group; otherwise entry can become expensive.
 

One of the best cities for an educational break is Amsterdam, where you can visit the Rijksmuseum with its astute and informative analysis of European history and its effect on the Netherlands. Add to that the Van Gogh museum and you have one of Europe's finest educational holidays. Another fine city for an educational break is London. From the Tate Modern to the Tate Britain, London, benefits from one of the most easily accessible museum and art collections - as most of these are free to get into. The Natural History Museum has a great emphasis on fun, but if you are after spectacular worldwide exhibitions then look no further than the Victoria and Albert Museum, host to some of the world's most unusual exhibitions. Finally there are some cities that wear their history on their sleeve. A great example of this is Berlin. In Berlin you can walk along the remaining parts of the Berlin Wall; see the scars on the Berliner Dom and visit the internationally renowned Holocaust Museum.

 

A simple way to get the kids around a city on an educational short break is to take a tour. Many tour buses will have paid guides who will tell you the history of the city. Added to that the extra benefit of having everybody off their feet, then you have the perfect way to inform and inspire without suffering the acute loss of energy that walking around a city can involve.