Thursday, March 27, 2008

First time to Explorit

I took the kids to Explorit for the first time. We haven't been before this because they usually don't open until 2 pm. Since it was a holiday they opened at 1pm, so we made the trip.

There was a lot of new stuff to try out and a few regular stuff from other places. Hunter's favorite was the race car track that you got to build along a wall. The trick was to keep the car on the track, but get it going as fast as possible. A lesson in physics to be sure...but it will be a while before they crunch any equations. The exposure to this sort of thing is excellent.

They had a craft room that was similar to the one in Stockton, but not as good. You were supposed to build something that would slow a marble down when dropped from shoulder height. Hunter worked on a wall mounted track that someone started and then left. Ethan wasn't interested in the project, so he built a boat out of recycled materials and lots of tape.

Another area had specific things you could build like a parachute or a helicopter with detailed instructions and pictures to follow along.


One of my favorites was a gear wall that had all sizes of different gears that were held to a metal wall with magnets. This design is so much better than the peg board because the arrangements are infinite. Elle liked to watch how they all turned at once when she cranked the one handle.

Something completely unique about this children's museum was their wet lab. Yes, they had a chemistry lab. I was in heaven! They had a couple of experiments with bromethyl blue which showed how it changed colors when you added vinegar or blew your breath into it. They had modified the straws to make sure the kids could blow but not suck any of the solution up and drink it. Hunter thought the straws were broken so he kept on opening one after another before I explained that they were supposed to be that way.

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