Museum Moment

My favorite moment in the museum was in the water play room. A boy dashed in full of excitement and immediately began turning a wheel that pulled a conveyor belt of various buckets, funnels, and strainers up and out of the water. At first he was just sheer exuberance as he saw that his action was controlling the conveyor belt. Then, while looking at the objects on the conveyor belt something caught his attention. He slowed down his turning of the wheel and watched as the water ran out of the bottoms of all of the containers on the belt. After a short pause he sped up his turning again to keep the water splashing and traveling up he conveyor belt faster than it could drain out. I thought this moment really clearly illustrated the many layers present in all of the Children’s Museum’s exhibits. The child was able to connect his actions with the actions of the conveyor belt, and in his moment of observation he observed some of the properties of water, how it flows and moves. I also appreciated the physicality of his play. Like the constructivists say, he was able to interact with the world, do something, observe the result, and begin to build his understanding about actions and matter.