Don't miss the debut of CMR's interactive playhouse!

The CMR's first interactive mini-exhibit, a playhouse we've dubbed "CMR Under Construction," will debut at the Aldrich Memorial Nursery School's annual carnival on Saturday, May 2, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

It is a really fun exhibit that will showcase the interactive fun that a children's museum can provide. We plan to use it at many upcoming community events, so hopefully you'll be seeing it (and us) soon!

Many thanks to Weis Builders for constructing the playhouse for us.

Fun and Learning at Healthy Kids Day

Our Farmer's Market exhibit was a success at the recent Healthy Kids Day event held at the Rochester Family Y. Thanks to all who stopped to visit. The children were able to do some role playing as market shoppers and cooks preparing a healthy meal. We've posted some pictures of the event here.

We'll be at several upcoming events in the next few months with this and other hands-on activities for kids. For more details, check out the events section on our website.

Grossology exhibit at La Crosse Children's Museum

There is currently a "Grossology" exhibit at the La Crosse Children's Museum (www.funmuseum.org). The description of the exhibit on La Crosse's website says "Grossology explores all the slimy, mushy, oozy, stinky, and gross (yet scientific) things that occur every day in the human body...Learn about snot, allergies, and more..." Sounds like a blast! One Rochester kid visited recently and especially enjoyed helping fill "Burp Man" with gas :) Anyone else been there? If so, please share your thoughts on this Blog or write to us at info@childrensmuseumrochester.org.

Healthy Kid's Day

The Rochester Family Y is hosting a Healthy Kids Day event this Saturday, April 18th from 9:30 AM to noon. Since we were generously invited to participate, CMR will be hosting a booth with a small, hands-on activity for the kids to complement the event.

There is more information about Healthy Kids Day on the Y's website. Hope to see you there!

If we build it....

..how many will come? It's one of the more popular questions we get about this project. So, let's look at the numbers...

In 2008, the Augsburg MBA program completed a study on behalf of CMR. A survey conducted as part of this study indicated that 61% would be willing to travel 40 miles or greater to visit the museum. This strong response convinced the researchers to expand their target demographic to a 50 mile radius of Rochester reaching nearly 60,000 children.

In the end, they projected attendance for the first five years of CMR's operation to be roughly 40,000 visitors per annum!

We want input from kids for our website!

We are trying to make the CMR website fun for kids as well as informative for parents and grandparents. In the Kids' Zone section of our website, we are posting kids' artwork and we are also asking kids to use their creativity to answer a different, fun question every month. We will post the kids' answers online. Our question for kids for April, 2009 is:

If you and your friends could bounce up and down on the clouds high up in the sky, what type of game would you play up there? How would you get down?

Send answers to info@childrensmuseumrochester.org. And check out the CMR Kids' Zone at:
http://www.childrensmuseumrochester.org/kids/index.html

CMR at the ACM Interactivity 2009

Later this month, the Association of Children's Museums will be hosting their annual conference, Interactivity, in Philadelphia. As an ACM member, CMR will be attending the Emerging Museum portion of the event on April 27th. The information we gained from last year's conference in Denver was instrumental in the recent completion of our fundraising feasibility study which showed strong community support for the project.

This year, specifically, we will be gaining insight and education on several topics including site selection, community partnerships, and exhibit design. In addition, we hope to meet some of the other regional emerging museum representatives.