Fun Preschool Activity: Visiting a Children’s Museum

I am a very big fan of children’s museums.  I am lucky that we live right near the Science Center in Ithaca, New York.  With that said, my all time favorite place is the Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, New York.  The only downside is that it is a two-hour drive for us, so we don’t get down there much.

We are looking to go soon as it is getting colder outside; cold and rainy or snowy days are the best to visit a nice warm, fun, and inviting museum.

Do you have a favorite children’s museum that you like to take your family too?

This is a picture of my daughter and her dad on our last trip to the National Museum of Play just over a year ago.  Doesn't that look like a lot of fun!

Strong National Museum of Play Video – Sarah and Sesame Street

This short video clip is from our trip to the Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, NY. It doesn’t have any sound, but is still kind of cute.

They have a Sesame Street exhibit and lots of mini-activities inside. One is where your child can appear on television with Sesame Street characters, like Elmo. I thought this was really neat! Here is my daughter. She kept trying to hug Elmo.

A Trip to the Zoo

Yesterday, we took a trip to the zoo. It was a lot of fun. It made for a long day and my daughter was so tired for the ride home, but still more than worth it.

Since we have made a lot of trips to the zoo, my daughter is very familiar with all of the animals, some of the sounds they make, and what foods they eat. If your child isn’t, a trip to the zoo is the perfect time to teach them about the many animals that can be found all around the world.

Our Little Preschool Field Trip

I wish that I had suggested this as a nice preschool field trip / activity before , but I didn’t even really think about it. We had picked pumpkins earlier and then I found this really cool place that was sort of near us. It was a drive, but boy was it worth it. It is the Iron Kettle Farm, located in New York. We called it the “Pumpkin Farm.”

Some of the pictures are above. My daughter had so much fun! I don’t like to post pictures of my daughter online, but I did want to show some pictures of our trip.

Preparing Your Child for Preschool – More Preschool Field Trips

Speaking of preschool field trips, we took our daughter to the zoo last weekend. This is the third time that she has been to the zoo this summer, but the zoo is something that a three year old, lol at least my three year old, never gets tired of. Here is a cute picture!

Preparing Your Child for Preschool – Preschool Field Trips

I know that many children are already starting to enter school this year, but that doesn’t happen until the beginning of September for my part of the area. If you have a little bit more time before you are going to send your child to preschool, if you plan on enrolling them in a preschool program this year, you may want to think about taking one last preschool field trip with them.

A while back, I outlined a number of great preschool field trips that you can take with your child. These preschool field trip ideas included petting zoos, zoos, parks, and local museums. Another preschool field trip that you may want to take is to a concert.

When it comes to concerts, many automatically think of nationally known musicians and $50 tickets. What is nice about using concerts as preschool field trips is that local concerts and local musicians will likely do. What you will want to do is pick up your local newspaper and see if any local bands are playing any free or even discounted concerts in your area. Most of those that perform in public places, such as parks, often have family friendly music; music that your toddler or preschooler would love dancing to!

Preparing Your Child for Preschool – More Preschool Field Trip Ideas

This is a post that somehow got saved as a draft instead of posted....

A few posts back, I was talking about taking preschool field trips with your child. One more place that you may want to check out is that of museums, namely ones designed for children.

What is nice about many kid’s museums is that many have fun interactive displays for your child to play with. What better way to prepare your child for their future, education wise, than with fun and exciting learning adventures.

We are in the planning stages of taking a trip to one of our local kid’s museums, lol actually it isn’t quite so local, as it is about a two hour drive. Anyways, I am posting a link to the website, so that you can know what to look for in a good kid’s museum. This museum is the Strong National Museum of Play. In our area, it comes highly rated and recommended.

Website for Strong National Museum of Play

Preparing Your Child for Preschool – More Preschool Field Trip Ideas

A few posts back, I was talking about taking preschool field trips with your child. One more place that you may want to check out is that of museums, namely ones designed for children.

What is nice about many kid’s museums is that many have fun interactive displays for your child to play with. What better way to prepare your child for their future, education wise, than with fun and exciting learning adventures.

We are in the planning stages of taking a trip to one of our local kid’s museums, lol actually it isn’t quite so local, as it is about a two hour drive. Anyways, I am posting a link to the website, so that you can know what to look for in a good kid’s museum. This museum is the Strong National Museum of Play. In our area, it comes highly rated and recommended.

Website for Strong National Museum of Play

Preparing Your Child for Preschool – More Field Trip Activities

In my last post, I outlined how you may want to think about taking your child to the zoo. Zoo trips are not only fun and exciting, but they can also be highly educational.

As nice as it is to take your child to the zoo, you may not have a zoo nearby your home, as they are often found near larger cities. If that is the case, you may want to think about seeing if you have any local petting zoos or petting farms nearby. While these establishments may not have as many animals as a traditional zoo would, they can still be fun and educational.

Even if you cannot find any local petting zoos or petting farms, you may want to think about contacting some local farm owners. You will find that a large number of farm owners would let you and your child visit their farm to explore. In fact, although some of your local farms may not be labeled as petting farms, some farm owners may actually have certain days where the general public is welcome to visit their farm.

Preparing Your Child for Preschool – Field Trip Time!

When looking for fun and exciting ways to prepare your child for preschool or kindergarten from home, you may want to think about trying to get out of the home.

That is what we will, hopefully, be doing soon. We have plans to soon go to the zoo. If you have never taken your child to the zoo, you should, especially if you have a local zoo nearby.

We are lucky because we have one about 40 minutes away from us that is pretty large in size. My daughter is only three, but we have usually gone to the zoo about three of four times a year. She loves it. I will never forget the first time that we took her; she couldn’t even walk, but she loved the animals.

It is fun to teach your child the animals. In addition to just letting your child know what animals they are looking at, you may want to help them learn where some of the animals come from, what they eat, or the sounds that they make.