We met some of our homeschooling buddies over at the children's museum this afternoon. This place is SUCH a perfect spot to spend a rainy afternoon! The kids burned off a lot of energy and had a blast, and we parents got some good chatting done. We also attended their daily animal program -- I don't like to photograph the animal on display as I don't want to frighten it, but today it was a Chinchilla. I've seen them before in pet stores and the like, but I've never had a chance to touch one -- they really ARE as soft as they say. We also learned that Chinchillas are an endagered species in their natural habitat (the mountaintops of the Andean mountains), that they live 15 to 20 years (the one we petted is 16 years old), and that it takes 100 Chinchillas to make a fur coat (a sad topic considering the cute furry little face staring back at us while we were presented with this fact!). We also were told that today is Endangered Species Day. I'm still not clear on what that means. But we wished Priscilla the Chinchilla a Happy Endangered Species Day anyway.
This unassuming little room is the "Shadow Room". Looks like an empty room, right? WRONG! It's full to the top with FUN! The deal is that the white wall behind the kids is some sort of....well, honestly I don't know. Photographic surface of some type? In any case, when the kids stand against it and the room is darkened, and a bright light is flashed (by pushing a button on the wall), the kids' shadows are "captured" on the white surface. It's totally wild, and obviously this is one of the kids' favorite museum activities, and they get really imaginative with creating their shadow pictures. One of these days I'll have to have one of the museum staff explain to me how it all works. I tried to photograph the room in use, but that just didn't work, everything was totally washed out including the kids, so I had to turn on the light and pull back the curtain to even get this much of a photo. Although when I did try to photograph the darkened room, the flash from my camera was enough to trigger shadow-capturing, which was an interesting discovery for all of us.
Giddyap, partner! Zoo Boy takes "his" horse on an adventure. Looks like he'd make a decent trail hand. Hmmm, that might come in handy....
We met some of our homeschooling buddies over at the children's museum this afternoon. This place is SUCH a perfect spot to spend a rainy afternoon! The kids burned off a lot of energy and had a blast, and we parents got some good chatting done. We also attended their daily animal program -- I don't like to photograph the animal on display as I don't want to frighten it, but today it was a Chinchilla. I've seen them before in pet stores and the like, but I've never had a chance to touch one -- they really ARE as soft as they say. We also learned that Chinchillas are an endagered species in their natural habitat (the mountaintops of the Andean mountains), that they live 15 to 20 years (the one we petted is 16 years old), and that it takes 100 Chinchillas to make a fur coat (a sad topic considering the cute furry little face staring back at us while we were presented with this fact!). We also were told that today is Endangered Species Day. I'm still not clear on what that means. But we wished Priscilla the Chinchilla a Happy Endangered Species Day anyway.
This unassuming little room is the "Shadow Room". Looks like an empty room, right? WRONG! It's full to the top with FUN! The deal is that the white wall behind the kids is some sort of....well, honestly I don't know. Photographic surface of some type? In any case, when the kids stand against it and the room is darkened, and a bright light is flashed (by pushing a button on the wall), the kids' shadows are "captured" on the white surface. It's totally wild, and obviously this is one of the kids' favorite museum activities, and they get really imaginative with creating their shadow pictures. One of these days I'll have to have one of the museum staff explain to me how it all works. I tried to photograph the room in use, but that just didn't work, everything was totally washed out including the kids, so I had to turn on the light and pull back the curtain to even get this much of a photo. Although when I did try to photograph the darkened room, the flash from my camera was enough to trigger shadow-capturing, which was an interesting discovery for all of us.
Giddyap, partner! Zoo Boy takes "his" horse on an adventure. Looks like he'd make a decent trail hand. Hmmm, that might come in handy....
2 comments:
what a fun day! i know that kind of shadow exhibit. i've seen it at other museums (the science museum in boston, maybe?) and i love it!
what children's museum is this? is it close to us?
Looks like a fun day. :)
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