DMNS–”Nature Unleased” A Twitter-based experience

A few weeks ago, some bloggin‘ moms were invited to preview the new special exhibit at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, called “Nature Unleashed: Inside Natural Disasters”. I got to go because I responded REALLY QUICKLY to the invite and the early bird gets the worm and all that.

I love the museum. I got a chance to preview another of their special exhibits last fall (the dinosaur one) and so I was stoked to go see this one. I like weather a little bit more then dinosaurs, so it was starting off well.

I took Pixie with me, so she could relish in not being the middle child for a few hours. I was playing around with my new Twitter account and updated to it as we went. What follows is the actual transcript of my Twitter posts, with additional commentary where necessary.

A night at the museum meets Twister

heading to the Den museum of nature and science to preview a new exhibit. Got invited as a blogger! Woot!4:08 PM Feb 11th from TweetDeck

Made it to the museum. Waiting with some other blogging moms. Greeblemonkey and weebleswobble from milehighmamas.5:37 PM Feb 11th from txt

(it was insanely fun to meet some of the gals from MHMs! They’re *real* bloggers (like I think they get invited to do stuff all the time and blog on important stuff)

Getting personal tour of nature unleashed exhibit from david grinspoon and tara hubner.5:47 PM Feb 11th from txt

(okay, that was WAY cool. we were like being escorted and stuff. it’s a shame I had a bouncy 6 yo with me…and had forgotten my tweed jacket. at the last preview event, they fed us snacks, but we didn’t have a personal escort–bloggers are moving up!)

The earthquake portion is interesting. Wild how many quakes there are worldwide.5:57 PM Feb 11th from txt

Watching some data on the quake that hit Indonesia a few hours ago5:58 PM Feb 11th from txt

(That was both interesting and a bit freaky to see data on something that had happened so few hours ago.)

Pixie’s biggest concern is that a tsunami will get us. Have said repeatedly that we don’t live by an ocean. showed her on map. No dice.6:26 PM Feb 11th from txt

(Pixie became increasingly concerned about natural disasters hitting us as we moved through the exhibit. They say the exhibit is designed for all ages, but I think they may have forgotten how scary these things are to kids…and the exhibit is over most younger kids’ heads, especially if they are not yet reading at a 3rd grade level or so. Not a lot of manipulatives, no “kid section” with books or even a hands on demo, aside from the digital volcanoes that are mentioned below. A disappointment and a little disturbing from a kid perspective.)

Kids making their own digital volcano. No mess!6:36 PM Feb 11th from txt

(Despite Pixie’s best efforts to hog the volcano making thingy, I didn’t have enough time to read it or otherwise figure out how her actions of mixing lava and steam were impacting the volcano showing up on the screen, so who knows how interactive it actually was. I’m pretty sure, but not positive, that she doesn’t know, either.)

Pixie and other kids like stomping to move the Richter scale6:36 PM Feb 11th from txt

(This was pretty fun. I hope the museum has factored in all the jumping up and down that is going to occur on that exact spot for weeks…)

Now she is worried about hurricanes. Jeepers6:41 PM Feb 11th from txt

Need to clarify, being escorted by dr. David grinspoon.6:43 PM Feb 11th from txt

(I have his card, so it was real. :)

The drawings by kids who lived through katrina are moving.6:48 PM Feb 11th from txt

(The Katrina portion, with artifacts and things from that hurricane, were probably the most interesting to me. Pixie liked the pictures the kids drew and we talked about what the kids were feeling. Spent the most time in this section.)

Pixie very interested in the mre’s. Talking a lot about how we have better warning systems. Ya know, for all the tsunamis in CO.6:51 PM Feb 11th from txt

(Again, with the natural disasters that don’t happen where we live! I can remember spending MONTHS convincing Sunshine that there was no way our house would be in a flood. Not only do we NOT live by a body of water, but we’re at the top of our street! Jeepers.)

(They had a little tiny wall with some blizzard stuff, but I would’ve liked to see more on that, actually.)

Ending exhibit seeing debris from a tornado. Interesting, probably not for kids less then 7 yo.7:01 PM Feb 11th from txt

So, overall, I would say this is not a particularly kid-friendly exhibit, unless your kids are older or really, really, really into weather and not likely to be wanting to do family tsunami drills after seeing the exhibit.

Sigh. I hope the museum invites me back again…

© 2009, melissa caddell. All rights reserved. If you steal my stuff, I will also be really, really mad.

Tagged as: Denver Museum of Nature and Science, DMNS, kids, twitter