Exhibits
Make a meal in our Texture Café, test your limits in our 3-story Climber, or relax and share a story in our Book Loft…these are just a few of the options that await you at the Children’s Museum of Phoenix. Let your child be your guide as you spend your day visiting all of our exhibits or spend hours at just one.
10,000 Blocks: The Sky’s the Limit (opening 2011)
Blocks are recognized as one of the most important play materials of childhood and, therefore, we have dedicated an entire area just to building with blocks. This beautiful space offers blocks of all sizes, shapes and colors, providing the raw materials for an amazing array of creative expression. Whether engaged in a sprawling group project or intensely focused on building a solitary structure, children test their skills in size and shape recognition, proportion, balance, symmetry, spatial awareness and patience! No doubt, it’s a place of towering possibilities.
Art Studio: Creative Expression
In this creative workshop with exposed 1913 brick walls, visitors find an ever-changing array of hands-on art activities that help them make connections to the real world as well as to other exhibits in the Museum. In the Art Studio you will find group activities, like Painting the Castle, and individual activities for your child to share with you.
Book Loft: Respite and Resource
Reading together is one of the most important activities a caregiver can do with a child as it nurtures a love of the written word and builds a foundation for literacy and later success in school. This space is more low-key than most - comfy and cozy to encourage children to snuggle in and read a good book. At the same time, books and resources abound for adults looking to learn more about child development, parenting skills and local resources. This loft space also affords a view to exhibit areas in the atrium space. Storytimes are presented every day in the Book Loft.
Building Big
Building forts, dens, lean-tos and other shelters seems to be a human instinct that is played out again and again during childhood. The exhibit provides a host of raw materials and found items that might represent columns, beams, walls and roofs, all typical elements of the construction industry. Building Big entices the boundless imaginations of children to creatively engineer their own personal forts or contribute to a larger cooperative building project. Alive with interactive play, the area hums with purposeful activity.
Desert Den
Inspired by the whimsical paintings of Carolyn Schmitz, Desert Den features the flora and fauna of Arizona’s ecosystems in a fanciful learning environment. When it comes to lovely desert attire or charming native habitats, inquiring minds want to know!
Market: Role Play
A trip to the grocery store becomes a delight as children make real choices about what products to put in the cart. Opportunities for role play abound as children restock the shelves, ring up the items as cashier, or fill the shopping cart as customer. Much like real life, the market experience exercises the child’s physical, cognitive and social skills.
Noodle Forest: Not Your Everyday Noodles
Oodles of noodles suspended from above offer sensory immersion in a unique and engaging environment. A thick forest of textural delight awaits visitors as they navigate this unfamiliar yet stimulating terrain. The Noodle Forest is guaranteed to activate the senses and inspire the giggles.
Pedal Power
Pedal Power is a long, narrow space perfect for riding tricycles – and that is just what young visitors can do here. Many young children never have the opportunity to ride a tricycle. Within the safe confines of the Museum, young visitors can learn to master the art of pedaling, test their sense of balance, and practice cooperative play as they stop and go on imagined roadways.
A tricycle "car wash" presents a unique experience as young drivers find their way through soft brushes, hanging strips and blowing fans. A mirrored tunnel excites children's imaginations as they safely zoom through on an adventure to somewhere.
Pit Stop
Pit Stop invites visitors to "race to the finish" on three levels of racetracks. Children launch innovative racecars from the upper deck and cheer as they zoom overhead and down the vertical drop to the finish line. The child's imagination takes over as he or she climbs into the modified racecar, revs the engine and takes off with tires screeching. A real motorcycle provides another means of "transportation" or just a cool spot to sit and watch the action. Of course, anything can happen and the car might be transformed into a rocket ship or a time machine at any moment!
Place for Under-Threes (No Shoes Please and Only Children 3 and Under)
This gallery is for our youngest visitors and has many components designed to meet the particular developmental needs of infants and toddlers. Crawling under a tree, watching planes from the deck, exploring with the senses, engaging in simple role play,-- this area is a visual delight for child and parent alike. It provides a warm and welcoming space for caregivers to spend time enjoying and learning about their little ones in the essential company of other grown-ups. And because there is so much crawling going on in this room, the Museum enforces a strict no shoes policy so that the little ones can enjoy this room in an environment that is as clean as possible. We've even created a very special shoe wall to keep your shoes in while you play!
Place for Under-Threes is restricted to children birth through 3 years old only. Children 4 and older will not be allowed in the Place for Under-Threes. If you are visiting the Museum with your 3 and younger child, but have siblings with you that are older, we encourage you to visit our other exhibits which have infant/toddler areas designed into them so that the whole family can enjoy playing together at the Museum! Thank you for helping to keep our youngest visitors safe.
Scattered Colors
A collection of exhibit pieces that introduce children to the playfulness of color in different mediums are scattered throughout the museum.
Texture Café: Silk and Velvet
In the lively, child-sized Café, customers of all ages order up food for the imagination. First, choose your role: Maitre d’, chef, or maybe ‘regular’ customer. Then, use an amazing array of fabrics and materials to create the meal of your dreams. Whether choosing green velvet for a spinach salad or scraps of silk for spaghetti, children actively engage all of their senses, garnished with creativity, to delight their customers. Tables and booths, counters and stools, and a full-service kitchen with ovens, stoves, storage and utensils provide the framework for culinary escapades. Enjoy and bon appetit!
The Schuff-Perini Climber
Towering above the Atrium floor, the Climber offers a bird’s eye view of the bustling activity below. Created from standard building materials, found objects, items out of context and a little inspiration from some wacky imaginations, this climbing adventure is guaranteed to stretch the muscles, provide a perceived feeling of risk and challenge all to climb to new heights.
The Grand Ballroom: Rock and Roll
The science of chain reaction comes to life on a grand scale as ramps encircle this room with stations to set up along the balls’ path. Smaller ball runs and exhibits that explore cause and effect combine to make this room a favorite with ball players young and old.
Whoosh!
Color Tossing captures the imagination and beckons children to join the intrigue of sound, movement, color, and the power of air. This wonderful contraption is a freestanding jumble of connected tubes where children feed scarves in a rainbow of colors into the transparent, air-powered structure. The colorful scarves shoot up through the pipes at high speeds, to heights of 20’ or more, and are released in a burst of energy from high above. In contrast they gently float down slowly to land on or be caught by children.
Windplay (opening 2011)
Scattered throughout the Museum’s exhibit areas, Windplay is a collection of air cannons used to activate mobiles, ruffle the hair of an unsuspecting visitor, or set a wall of lightweight disks shimmering in movement and light. The power of moving air is a force to be reckoned with under the direction of children young and old.