Scouts as Stewards

This article, by Museum Learning Programs Developer Samantha Polon, was also posted on Kidoinfo.

Scouting is often a springboard for youth to learn how to be stewards of their communities. Learning about teamwork, problem solving and even meeting workers from fireman to teachers to find out about their professions are all common and enriching activities Scouts participate in. But what about teaching youth to be stewards of the environment? Expressions like “going green” and “eco-friendly” are commonplace these days, everywhere from the grocery store to schools, but what do these ideas really mean? What actions can we take and what visions can we share about our future that will help to preserve and protect the natural resources we see threatened around us?

As a Girl Scout growing up, I was presented with the opportunity to spend time in the out-of-doors, hiking, camping and swimming all over New England.  My mother, a lawyer, loved the chance to take a group of suburban girls on overnights where we got away from the hustle and bustle of our everyday lives. While we were on those trips, we did so much more than roast marshmallows, sing songs and learn to identify different varieties of birds. Those times in the forest taught us to look for and appreciate the nature all around us. They offered us a place of respite and a moment to reflect. After those trips, we sought the same feelings of peace and joy in local parks and hunted for leaves in our neighborhood playgrounds.

Providence Children’s Museum’s Eco Explorers adventures present Scouts with the opportunity to learn about conservation by working through hands-on problem solving activities that explore finite natural resources – like water and wildlife – that can be found in the deep wilderness and in the city. Scouts investigate simple circuits and the energy expenditure of LED and traditional bulbs, which can help them support their schools and families in making energy conscious decisions. They learn how to look for signs of animals and recognize shelters so they can preserve these creatures’ habitats. Most importantly, Scouts learn to value the natural world that is all around them – and is a critical part of their communities and everyday lives.

During the first Eco Explorers event in December, I watched as Scouts built simple water wheels from plates and cups. One boy exclaimed, “I never knew that water could make energy!” It’s realizations like these, which arise through fun, hands-on learning, that will help kids become the next generation of stewards our planet needs.

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Eco Explorers Scout Adventures
Cub Scouts | February 27
Brownies/Junior Girl Scouts | March 13, March 27, April 10 and May 1

Scouts learn about conservation, recycling and the wonder of the natural world through creative interactive science experiments and art activities. Explore energy and create circuits, construct a water wheel, create an animal habitat story and more! Events include engaging educator-led activities, a Scout skill badge or Science Belt Loop, an Eco Explorers fun patch, a snack, and a pass for a future Museum visit.

Space is limited; register NOW to join the fun!  Click here to learn more.

Learning from the Legacy of Martin Luther King Jr.

This article, by Museum Education Director Cathy Saunders, was also posted on Kidoinfo. 

I started school in the early 70s, a white child in a Boston suburban school that had integrated busing.  I wondered what it would be like to have an hour-long bus ride to school, but I gave no thought to why other students traveled so far each day. A few years later, when a special holiday was created to celebrate the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and our teachers began to talk with us about the civil rights movement, I began to understand things that I was seeing around me.

I was shocked to learn that white and black children had not been allowed to go to school together or even play together. I was relieved to know that someone as courageous as Dr. King had stood up to the injustice – and I was in awe of the pictures of thousands of people who stood behind him at rallies and marches. They were all brave. It made me scared and proud.

I was relieved to know that I wasn’t growing up in that confusing time when children were barred from attending school. But then I started to notice and question other things that didn’t make sense. How come the children from Boston were bused to our schools, but we weren’t bused into Boston schools? Even though black and white children played together, how come we lived in different neighborhoods and why did we have different toys?

My parents did not always know how to discuss these issues with me. But, they were honest and truthful about their own experiences, even when it felt insufficient to me. Sometimes I asked the questions at very embarrassing moments. They compassionately answered my questions as I posed them, and asked me how I thought things should be. I didn’t just want answers, I wanted to make things right.

Fast forward to 2015. Now Martin Luther King Jr. Day is a federal holiday and the president of the United States is African American. So much progress has been made; we have moved beyond many of the problems that spurred the civil rights movement. Yet, recent events in Ferguson and New York City have made it painfully clear that discrimination, prejudice and inequality based on race are still present.

Why is Dr. King’s work relevant to the issues of today? How do we talk with children about these difficult issues? It’s important that we do not put Dr. King on a pedestal. He didn’t work alone; many people, black and white, old and young, were involved. These leaders and every day heroes of the civil rights movement can be inspiration to us now – there are things that both adults and children can do to help combat racism. That’s why the Museum is committed to celebrating Dr. King’s legacy each year.  Through performance, displays and an interactive activity about discrimination, parents and children are given a unique opportunity to discuss these hard issues – about history as well as where children see inequality in their own lives.

Every family will have their own starting point to this conversation. In addition to the Museum’s event there are some excellent resources that might be useful for your family:

How to Teach Kids About What's Happening in Ferguson
This article from The Atlantic has extensive resource lists for teachers and parents including a list of recommended children’s books.

Talking About Racism With White Kids
This post on the The New York Times Motherlode blog also includes links to other posts dealing with race, racism and difficult conversations.

Talking to Our Children About Racism & Diversity
This excellent document developed by the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights Education Fund provides helpful guidelines for answering hard questions from children and some suggestions of “what you might say when your child says ‘….’”

Join the Museum’s Celebration of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on Monday, January 19 from 11:30 AM to 4:00 PM.  See history come to life through songs and stories during powerful performances of “M.L.K.: Amazing Grace” at 11:30 AM, 1:00 PM and 2:30 PM. Also explore a display of photographs, words and books describing Dr. King’s life and work and take part in a provocative anti-discrimination activity. Learn more.

Rigamajig!

New this summer, invent creative contraptions with Rigamajig, an exciting large-scale building kit featuring wooden planks, wheels and pulleys plus rope, nuts and bolts. Conceived by RISD Industrial Design professor Cas Holman (a great friend of the Museum!), Rigamajig inspires kids’ imaginative hands-on play, encourages exploration of engineering, and cultivates collaborative construction.

We’ve seen kids tinker and build with Rigamajig with some wonderful results, including a mobile movie projector, lawnmower and sled, an elaborate home/doghouse, and plenty of inspired creations that defy definition!

See some great examples in this video of Rigamajig, filmed in part at the Museum:
 

Join us to explore Rigamajig most Wednesdays, July through mid-August, from 2:00 - 4:00 PM, and at the Museum’s summer Play at the Park events.

Learn more about Rigamajig: (featuring photos taken at the Museum!)

• No Instructions, No Right Answers: A 263-Piece Building Kit For Curious Kids (Fast Company/Co.Design)
• Interview with Cas Holman (KaBOOM!)

Rigamajig and other Museum spatial thinking activities are supported by National Grid.

Celebrating the Legacy of Dr. King

Each year, the Museum presents a day of special programming to commemorate the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Storytellers and actors Rochel Coleman and Valerie Tutson bring history to life through songs and stories as they portray well-known Civil Rights activists and ordinary Americans who changed the world. Families also explore a display about Dr. King's life and work and can choose to participate in an interactive anti-discrimination activity, during which they wear a red or green tag and encounter “red only” and “green only” labels throughout the Museum – on lunchroom tables, bathroom doors, water fountains and more.

The activity and performance inspired reflection, thought-provoking conversations, and these wonderful responses to the question, “What will you do to fight racial discrimination?”:

And what will YOU do?

Thanks to Providence Tourism Council and Herman H. Rose for their support of this event.

After the Beanstalk: Jack, Jill and the Giant

This post about a new interactive Museum performance was shared by AmeriCorps Museum Educator Francesca Montanile.

When the theatre team assembled for our first meeting, we had no idea what our new play would be.  Despite the uncertainty, there was an excitement in the air.  Dozens of ideas were tossed around, but we kept coming back to a sequel to Jack and the Beanstalk. The ideas for different scenes, participatory challenges, and plot twists came naturally, buzzing with possibility. We gathered a team of theatre makers and educators to refine our storyline and the script was born.

The 20-minute performance tells the story of Jack, who is kidnapped and taken to Cloud Town after breaking the Giant’s crown. His sister Jill enlists the audience to help rescue him.  In Cloud Town, they tackle a series of spatial thinking challenges to escape. In the end, they must meet the Giant face to face!

One of our guiding principles throughout the process was to make the play as participatory as possible. The Museum is a place for play and exploration, and we wanted our audience to be a part of the story.

To me, the creation of the play itself felt like a puzzle. It was inspiring to see how many people from the Museum’s community chipped in and added an essential piece to the final product. From the backdrop sewn by Philenda, to the rock set piece made by the exhibits team, to the contributions of fellow AmeriCorps members – finger puppets sewn by Amanda and brilliant set and props by Sarah and Mandy – the play was collaborative in every sense of the word. The Giant’s evolution was like a visual timeline of our process.  From its humble beginnings as a huge blue yoga ball to a loveable big-eyed puppet, many hands helped apply paper maché and many minds brainstormed its mechanics.

When the morning of the opening performance arrived, I began to get a little nervous. It felt like a piece of our puzzle was missing.  As I spoke my first lines, it became immediately clear: the children in the audience were the missing piece! All of a sudden, the story was alive and exciting. The challenges were urgent. The Giant was gigantic!

The play is a joy to perform because the energy kids create is infectious. Their tendencies to speak aloud, get the “wiggles,” and experience the story in real time might be a challenge in a conventional theatre setting but become assets as they transform into our play’s heroes.

After the Beanstalk is presented Mondays through August 12 at 10:30 & 11:30 AM and 12:30 & 1:30 PM; recommended for ages 3 and up.

Commemorating Dr. King

Each year, the Museum presents a day of special programming to commemorate the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Families see a powerful performance reenacting moments from the Civil Rights movement, explore a display about Dr. King's life and work, and can choose to participate in an interactive anti- discrimination activity, during which they wear a red or green tag and encounter “red only” and “green only” labels throughout the Museum – on lunchroom tables, bathroom doors, water fountains and more.

The activity and performance inspired reflection and thought-provoking moments and conversations, shared by the Museum’s AmeriCorps members:

• A mother was intrigued by the anti-discrimination activity and explained that today’s rules said that, rather than use the open green bathroom, they had to wait for the red one. The younger boy, about 3, wanted no part of waiting, but her older son (6 or 7) explained that, “Even though you might be sad now that we have to wait, we are only red for one day.” Mom said, “Yes, thanks to people like Dr. King, anyone can use any bathroom on any day like it should be.”

• After the performance, parents sat and talked to their children about what they remembered about Dr. King. One family talked about their grandmother’s own experiences with segregation on a bus. An older man talked to a young father about a friend he knew who went to jail for his work in the Civil Rights Movement. 

• A little boy said he knows that MLK practiced nonviolence. Janice said she was alive when MLK was alive. The boy’s face changed. He is biracial. He said, “Discrimination means Mommy and Daddy couldn’t be married.” 

• A family ran into friends after a performance of “M.L.K.: Amazing Grace.” One family was African American and the other white. The grandmother in the white family said, “I remember all of that. People in Providence were very angry when Dr. King was killed. People were angry everywhere.” The father of the black family was moved by the performance and said he remembered his best friend’s father, a white man, bailed him out of jail. There was a thoughtful silence while they watched their children play together. 

And some comments from visitors – kids and adults – in response to the question, “What will you do to fight racial discrimination?”:

"I think I'll do everything mom tells me to do."

Discovery Studio Finishing Touches

We're finally ready to open Discovery Studio tomorrow! Here's a look at what's happened over the past week.

New sinks were installed, adult and child sized.

Graphic Designer Valerie Haggerty-Silva painted the Discovery Studio entryway – the portal, as we've come to know it!

Program coordinators Carly Baumann and Mary Scott Hackman began moving materials into the Studio, including program supplies...

as well as plenty of artful, inspiring objects to decorate the room.

We worked on the initial documentation wall display, which documents the process of creating Discovery Studio.

And Exhibit Designer Chris Sancomb and Exhibit Technician Hillel O'Leary installed panels and a canopy to create a cozy nook.

Activity supplies are ready to go!

A view of the full room - compare to the concept drawing!

Join us to celebrate the opening of Discovery Studio tomorrow and all weekend! Drop in from 10:00 AM to 4:00 PM to sample a selection of imaginative activities that will be offered throughout the summer. Build with colorful blocks and prisms, create crafts that catch the sun’s rays, and explore the art and science of water, color and light.

We look forward to sharing it with you!

A Conversation with Carly Baumann & Mary Scott Hackman

Meet the educators responsible for Discovery Studio and other Museum programs: Education Programs Coordinator Carly Baumann and Early Childhood Programs Coordinator Mary Scott Hackman.

What’s your background?
Carly: I first came to the Museum to be part of the 2003-04 AmeriCorps team, from a background in education, and worked with Learning Clubs developing hands-on activities and after-school programs. After my AmeriCorps year, I worked in Providence after school and taught elementary school and returned to the Museum in 2007 as a staff member.

Mary: My background is in early childhood. Prior to coming to the Museum in April 2008, I spent a year teaching Head Start teachers at Ready to Learn Providence how to weave literacy into their curriculum. Before that, I was training early childhood educators and teacher assistants in the Providence school system.

Describe your role(s) at the Museum.
M: My focus is bringing information about early child development and things that appeal to children ages 1-6 to the Museum. I plan programs, oversee the AmeriCorps team that works with Head Start (ages 3-6) children, and think about what’s best for our youngest visitors.

C: Both Mary and I help shape the learning experiences children and families have at the Museum and identify learning targets. I design programs for kindergarteners and up and mentor our AmeriCorps members working in the after-school community to develop hands-on curriculum to Museum standards and philosophy while guiding their growth as educators.

M: Carly and I have also have a responsibility to the wider community of sharing the Museum’s philosophy about the ways children learn with other educators.

C: And with other staff, too – Experience Coordinators, Play Guides, interns. Not just procedures of what we do but the why.

In general, what’s the role of Museum programs?
C: Museum exhibits are designed to be handled and experimented with by thousands of children. Programs allow us to take the same philosophy of hands-on learning and expand it to materials and tools that are messy, risky, small, delicate in ways we couldn’t do in exhibits. They allow us to be more spontaneous and try out new ideas while offering activities, challenges and support for children to be independent and creative.

What’s the goal of having a dedicated program space like Discovery Studio?
C: We are creating an environment specifically designed to be an inspiring place to hold our programs. Currently we have flexible rooms that can be anything. Flexibility has been important to maximize our space, but it means hauling materials from the basement, moving tables and stools for every program. We want the experience to be more efficient for staff while giving visitors access to more materials. It’s really a learning space. It will always there – we can put things up on the walls and keep them there, or change it over time.

M: Components of the Studio that will help all of us are opportunities to store things there, to have sand and water tables available at any time as well as manipulatives and books. We’ll have a tortoise and living plants, to give children opportunities to observe. And a nook, a place to retreat to – a quiet space for a family to read a book, with comfy pillows.

C: We’ve thought about how design works with different ages. We wanted to play with levels in Discovery Studio – higher tables for activities designed for older children, lower tables for toddlers and preschoolers. When visitors walk in the door, they’ll instinctively know what’s appropriate for them. Of course anyone is allowed to explore any area of the Studio, but it allows us to better respond to the needs of visitors.

M: We’ll also have areas in the room where children’s work is displayed so visitors can see what happens there and the types of experiences they can have.

C: We also have the opportunity to try something new, to have ongoing art or creative projects that children can continue to come back to. Another piece of our learning is giving visitors access to these experiences as long as the Museum is open. Sometimes experiences will be facilitated, but other times they will be self guided, with hints and ideas.

What inspiration did you draw on in planning the space and the programs?
C: Primarily we drew on what we’ve learned from the programs that we run, that we respond best to visitors when we offer multiple ways in, when we invite them to experience materials in different ways.

M: And when we give a longer window in which to explore – we designed the space and program time so that children can drop in and leave and come back, that there’s no pressure to complete or finish. Open-ended time is important to the child’s process. I’ve also been influenced by the words of [Reggio Emilia founder] Loris Maliguzzi, who said that rather than teaching children anything, giving them materials to interact with is the way we should be educating. Children need the time and the space to manipulate materials.

C: Immersing ourselves in other studio environments, from art studio spaces designed for children to nature labs. Each of us involved in this project has drawn on spaces where we find inspiration.

Why and how are you documenting what happens in Discovery Studio?
M: The Museum is already documenting, through the blog and collecting great stories. The visitor experience has always been elicited, via exhibit “talk-back” boards, the “show-off” shelf in Shape Space and directly from the visitor. We want to continue that in Discovery Studio by capturing a moment a child has and making it come alive.

C: We’ll have a permanent place to show children’s work, photographs, quotes and tell the story of the learning happening in the Studio. It gives us a chance to develop our own professional practice, to talk deliberately about the kinds of learning we’re supporting and how we can do better.

M: Documentation also shows children how much we value what they’re thinking, and that’s a really important message we want to give our visitors.

Documentation wall prototype.

What are you most looking forward to once Discovery Studio is open?
C: For me, seeing where the visitors take it. We can only plan up to a certain point. What’s really going to make this space magical is what children bring to it, and we can learn from them.

M: I am so excited that the room will appeal to a very wide range of development and age – to see an 11-year-old alongside a 2-year-old in the same space, each doing an activity and being industrious, and that so much of an exchange will go on because of that.

C: Learning Clubs will also be held in Discovery Studio and I’m so excited to see this space used for the hands-on activities our AmeriCorps member develop for children who have such limited access to beautiful materials in their classrooms or community centers.

PlayWatch: Block Builders

This post was contributed by AmeriCorps Museum Educator Cassandra Kane.

My favorite part about working with children is that I’m constantly in awe of their creative powers and imaginative play.

I was recently struck by one girl’s ability to transform a pile of ordinary blocks into an inventive “royal palace” scene during the Museum’s Block Builders program, which invites children to build with a variety of blocks and interesting materials. I watched as 7-year-old Cassie wandered the room, inspected each kind of block, and meticulously selected supplies for her project. She picked a spot to build and let her imagination run wild as she created an elaborate castle, block by block.Wood blocks stacked two or three high served as the outer frame, and a pyramid of additional wood blocks towered in the back, topped with a wood rectangle featuring a spinning flower “because princesses like picking pretty flowers,” according to Cassie.

She turned pink, green, and yellow plastic cylinders into soaring towers on the left and right sides of her castle. Blue and red tinted blocks instantly transformed into the vigilant and stern “guarders” John and Austin, who kept close watch on movement by the witch’s army from the “evil place,” another structure Cassie built a few feet from the castle’s grounds. There, a “mean old witch” trapped princesses in a red plastic cylinder covered with a large hardwood tray.
Cassie also used wood blocks to build items outside her castle, including a moat, a tree house, a refrigerator, and a table – created by placing a purple circular block on top of four Lincoln logs.

Inside the elaborate edifice, two princesses (pink and purple tinted blocks) named Cassie and Haylee ate a nourishing lunch consisting of their favorite foods and drink: donuts, ice cream, and chocolate milk. (Haylee is Cassie’s 6-year-old friend, who focused her attention nearby on balancing colorful acrobats on top of each other’s shoulders).

After her caregiver suggested it was time to move on to another area of the Museum, Cassie exclaimed, “I want to stay here and play!”

They left a few minutes later, though, and I couldn’t help but wonder how the tale would have continued and what else Cassie’s creative mind would have conjured up!

Kids are Engineers!

This article by Program Developer Carly Baumann and was originally posted on Kidoinfo.

A favorite Children’s Museum activity, Puff Mobiles are made by constructing simple wheeled cars with paper sails, designed to catch the stream of air a child blows through a straw. I’ve seen kids innovate with many creative constructions over the years: wide sails, double sails, weighted bases.I observed Puff Mobiles in an after-school Learning Club and noticed a child who appeared to be disengaged. Instead of huffing and puffing on her vehicle, she rested it on the floor while her eyes wandered the room. Overturning a Styrofoam tray of paper, she fanned the tray in her face, blinking in the wind. Then she waved it rapidly at her sail, sending the vehicle steadily forward. Just as I began to tell her how excited I was and that I had never seen anyone try that technique before, she picked up a carpet square and flapped it at the Puff Mobile, launching it halfway across the room!

This 8-year-old girl was an engineer – applying imagination and analytical thinking to solve a problem, pulling herself so far out of the box she transcended the problem of the sail and changed the air itself! In our day-to-day lives, we overcome challenges by thinking like engineers all the time: assessing the situation, testing and re-testing solutions to make the best of the resources we have available to us. The more practice children (and all of us!) have stretching our problem-solving muscles, the more flexible and creative our thinking becomes.


2011 marks the 60^th anniversary of National Engineers Week, February 20-26. Volunteers from the Rhode Island Chapter of the American Society of Civil Engineers will lead engineering activities with Children’s Museum visitors this month. I asked several of the engineers what types of play they were drawn to as kids, and how the adults in their lives supported their interests. Not surprisingly, fort building and creating cities and bridges with blocks and other open-ended construction toys was echoed by each of the engineers. But I was also struck by the common theme of having time and space to figure things out on their own and bring their imaginations to their play.

• Jen DiStefano benefited from a balance of sports, which helped her get comfortable with her position in a team dynamic, and child-driven, unplugged play – “finding ways to occupy our time… outside from early morning to sunset.”
• According to Chad Morrison, “Any sort of toy that involved building and understanding how the parts go together really appealed to me.” (Chad is now designing stairs for the LEGO facility in Enfield, CT!)
• “I would keep all my LEGOs in one huge bin and then just start building an idea and figure out what I needed to do to get there,” Doug Martin remembered.
• “We constantly designed stadiums and houses,” said Matt Pitta. “My parents were supportive and positive, even when supplying constructive criticism on the designs.”

Kids are engineering whenever they dig a moat for their sandcastle or arrange a fort of sofa cushions – special supplies aren’t required. Ideas for engineering challenges using every day materials, like designing catapults or animation toys, are a fun and interactive way to shake up play routines at home. Some great resources the Museum uses are from the PBS shows “FETCH! with Ruff Ruffman,” “Design Squad Nation” for 9-12 year olds, and the now-cancelled “ZOOM”; also Things to Make and Do from the Exploratorium, an incredible San Francisco museum of science, art and perception.

Have fun scratching your heads and discovering “Eureka!” moments as engineers at home!

Join Providence Children’s Museum to celebrate National Engineers Week AND February school vacation! Be An Engineer and experiment with electrical conductivity and oobleck on February 19. Block Builders tackle construction challenges on February 23 & 25. And Young Engineers learn how civil engineers plan buildings and bridges on February 26. Visit the Museum’s website for details.