Preparing for Play Fest

Get ready for some serious playing! Next Sunday, November 23, the entire Museum will be overtaken by Play Fest from 1 to 4 PM. Play Fest? Doesn't play happen here all over, all the time? Well, yes, but this is a special celebration of play, an extension of the opening festivities of Play Power. We'll have imaginative activity stations scattered throughout the Museum that encourage and incorporate many different kinds of play.

Play Fest was planned by Museum education staff, primarily our newest team of 11 AmeriCorps members. They've dreamed up a day of fabulous fun, and last week I observed them working – and playing! – hard to prepare.

The Blue Crew (Kate, Liz, Miranda and Whitney) will engage visitors in a series of creative movement and music workshops, including tap dancing, sound effect and instrument-making, and even beatboxing!

With the Red Crew (Katie, Kelly and Paul), kids and adults will explore the visual arts as they make colorful masks and collages, weave giant patterns, build big with boxes and indulge their senses with an investigation of different textures.

And the Green Crew (Camille, Jennifer, Melissa and Molly) will facilitate an outdoor experience inside as families touch squishy & slimy things in The Swamp and let loose in the Big Woods play structure, where they'll even encounter Mortimer the Moose!

It's going to be great fun – don't miss it!