Sound Showers

-Michael Nicholas, Social Media and Marketing Intern

As an intern who was also a visitor to the Museum when I was younger, I have the unique opportunity to look back on how the favorite exhibits of my childhood have changed since I experienced them as a kid.  I remember specifically being drawn to the mUSic gallery, which is now reimagined as “Sound Showers.”  It is still one of my favorite places in the Museum because of how amazed visitors are as they experience sound and music in different ways. 

            Similar to the exhibit configuration that preceded it, the first room of “Sound Showers” is structured like a drum circle that greatly encourages cooperation between visitors who may not have previously known each other. I remember being amazed by how anyone could step up to a drum or marimba without any previous musical experience and could create cohesive music.  I learned recently that it was because the instruments in the room are all tuned to the pentatonic scale so they all work together musically.  It is such a fun experience to be able to make music together with others.

            The other areas in the exhibit, however, were completely new to me returning to the Museum now many years after my last visit.  I discovered the 3D sound room and saw what an amazing place it is for kids to learn to place importance on their sense of hearing even beyond what might normally be considered “music.”  It’s really fun to see visitors realize that they can get visual information through their ears as they describe in detail the image that they create in their heads from the sound effects.  I’ve seen kids be so excited to recognize a train or a cow by the sounds in the room and also so surprised as they really feel the sound of the subwoofer that is placed under the seats.

            The last area of the exhibit is the room devoted to sound and music found in more commonplace objects. This really enforces the message of the exhibit that there is music and rhythm wherever we look.  The accessibility of music made from common objects really encourages kids to be more in tune with the sounds that are around them every day.

Family Dinner

-Michael Nicholas, Social Media and Marketing Intern

New experiences are part of the daily routine at LICM. We’re always looking for new additions to our popular exhibits to provide new experiences for our visitors.  The newest addition is on view in the Yellow Studio in the “Feasts for Beasts” and includes the work of Adelphi University students Griffin Lord, an intern in the museum’s graphic design department as well as a graphic design major at Adelphi, and Jessica McComsey, an education major at Adelphi and intern in the exhibits department of the museum. The pair set out to create a board game for the ‘Feast for Beast’ gallery. 

The development of the “Family Dinner” board game started with the idea of a “food chain” theme that could be a fun way for visitors to apply the knowledge learned in the ‘Feasts for Beasts’ exhibit. Jessica was greatly involved with the development of the content and concept of the game.  She came up with the idea of a board game where the player chooses an animal piece representing a carnivore (lion), an omnivore (human), or an herbivore (rabbit).  The player has to choose the correct path of appropriate food for their animal to eat to get them home to their family dinner. The game reinforces multiple educational threads found in the “Feasts for Beasts” exhibit. Jessica was able to take away a lot from the interactive and hands-on approach to learning in the exhibits department that she wants to apply to her time in the classroom.

Griffin was charged with the graphic design and presentation of the game board.  He was able to apply what he learned in his graphic design classes as well as create work that will be a great addition to his portfolio.  He hand drew all of the game board illustrations and game pieces.  He put together the layout of the game in a way that best represented Jess’s concept and game idea.  This board game is now out on the floor and ready to play in the Yellow Studio. Which animal will you choose?

Griffin Lord is a graphic design student at Adelphi University who will be entering his senior year in the fall. He recently completed a summer internship as a graphics assistant for the Long Island Children’s Museum as part of Adelphi’s Community Fellows program. During his time at the museum, he assisted with creating, printing, installing, and maintaining the museum’s signs and graphics. He also drew the illustrations for a new board game that was recently installed in the museum’s Feast for Beasts exhibit.

Jessica McComsey is a rising senior at Adelphi University. She is an Education and Math major in the University’s STEP program.  At the Long Island Children’s Museum, she was an intern for the summer under Erik Schurink in the Exhibits department.

 

Maker Monday

-Michael Nicholas, Social Media and Marketing Intern

With the DIY (Do It Yourself) and maker movements gaining traction across the country, hands on learning experiences for children have started to get the recognition they deserve.  The Long Island Children’s Museum has always fostered an interactive learning experience for kids, but with the rise of maker faires and sites like instructables.com and makezine.com it seemed like a great time to start a program that would even more specifically help kids explore science and other topics through design projects. Following on the development of LICM’s previous well-received ‘Broken? Fix-it’ exhibit, it was a natural next step for the museum.  This idea turned into the now widely popular Maker Mondays series launched this summer.  The series seemed like a perfect project for Beth Ann Balalaos, who is an education major interning at the Museum through Adelphi’s Community Fellows program, to work on.

            The goal of Maker Mondays is to engage kids through interactive, hands on, and fun projects.  As the program progressed from week to week, staff participants, including Beth Ann, confirm that these activities have been very effective in sparking an interest in science with participants.  The kids loved how they were able to apply what they just learned to an actual take away project.  This helped kids conquer different concepts while having fun, while leaving room for creativity in their own design project.  While doing the clay pot projects, all the kids who participated learned and applied the technique taught to make the pots, but finished projects looked different because of each child’s design choice. 

            As an education major, Beth Ann has been able to take a lot from the experience as she prepares to teach in the future.  She’s gained an understanding of structuring the projects and activities as she researched and planned an activity for each week.  Also, the experience of interacting with the kids directly proved valuable.  She’s seen how kids need a more hands-on approach to learn effectively.  She specifically loved the brush bot activity for this reason because she really saw kids learning through trial and error while they were troubleshooting problems with their bots. This interactive approach became the way that the staff of the program effectively held the interest of the participating visitors.  “Kids are amazing in the way that they are just curious about everything,” Beth Ann noted. “It’s just a matter of capturing their attention and then keeping it.” This experience has given Beth Ann a new outlook on how to help kids learn in the classroom and is sure to be a valuable experience for her future teaching career. Catch the last Maker Monday of the year on 8/25 at 11 am.

 

Beth Ann Balalaos is a rising senior from Adelphi University.  She is a psychology and elementary education major with a concentration in special education and a minor in gender studies. She will be receiving her master’s in education in 2016 through Adelphi’s STEP program. Currently, Beth Ann is interning in the education department at the Long Island Children’s Museum. 

Alice in Radioland

-Michael Nicholas, Marketing and Social Media Intern

Before the days of television and internet, radio was the primary medium of not only news, but also entertainment.  With the height of radio show popularity in the 1940s, this way of listening to stories became more than just a way to entertain oneself. At this point in history, it was largely an opportunity for families to spend time together.  So when LICM looked to adapt the classic story of Alice’s Wonderland for the stage, the format of a radio show seemed like an ideal to bring audience members, young and old, together to experience not only this classic tale, but also share the magic of storytelling.

This production is made special because of how personal it is to the Long Island Children’s Museum.  Staff members are playing the parts in a radio style performance where sound and imagination are the focus.  Keeping with the theme of a radio production, there is not a huge set or a lot of physical acting.  The focus will be on sound effects and vocal performance that spark children’s imaginations.  Children will see sounds being created to help them identify what elements of the story are being represented. This gives the audience a sense of the “behind-the-scenes magic” that occurred during productions of that time period.  The goal is to replicate the feeling of being in an actual radio studio for the audience members.  It invites kids to look at the classic tale in a new way.

Adelphi Community Fellows intern Tim Oriani  has been instrumental in adapting a theater script to fit this style of storytelling.  Commenting on the process Tim said, “This project was definitely a challenge for me. As an actor, I’m used to creating a visual, physical experience.”  He noted, “Using just sounds and voices forced me to rethink everything concerning dialogue, narration, and plot; pretty much the entire show, actually.” As a theater major, Tim was able to bring his experience in acting and writing to the museum stage.  Stop by the LICM Theater on August 6 at 11:30 a.m. or 2 p.m. to see what Tim and the LICM staff have created.

 

 

 

Tim Oriani is the Theater Production Intern at the LICM, working with LICM Theater Manager Jim Packard. His responsibilities include interaction with performers, helping run music and lights and performance set up and break down. In addition to adapting the script of the children’s theater piece by Deborah Lynn Frockt to create “Alice in Radioland, Tim performed in the recent production of Happy as a Clam: The Musical.

Michael Nicholas is the Marketing and Social Media intern at the museum through Adelphi University’s community fellows program.  He studies English Literature at school and will be returning this coming fall to complete his junior year.  At the museum, he has been kept busy with everything from photo coverage of events to blog posts about LICM.