Kohl Children’s Museum president Sheridan Turner said she’ll never forget the morning she opened “Japan and Nature,” their first culturally specific exhibit. She was at the museum early for a TV interview and asked a woman who had come with her family for help pronouncing the name of a town spotlighted in the exhibit.
“She said ‘That’s the town that I was born in and I am so thrilled that you have this exhibit because it gives me the opportunity to share my culture and where I grew up with my children since we can’t afford to all go to Japan.'”
Now the Glenview museum is giving more families the chance to share their culture or to learn about an entirely new one through the exhibit “Children’s China: Celebrating Culture, Character and Confucius” which runs from Jan. 20 through April 25. The exhibit is part of the Freeman Foundation Asian Culture Exhibit Series, the same group that brought “Japan and Nature” to Kohl.
“For children who are of Chinese heritage and are maybe second generation or first generation it gives them the chance to see where they came from,” Turner said. “We’ve wanted to do more because we are in such a diverse community. We welcome children and families from so many cultures.”
The space is divided into six immersive environments: a home, market, restaurant, park, school and panda reserve. Quotes from Confucius are presented throughout, such as “young people should honor their parents and respect their elders” in the home section.
“An underlying moral thread that runs through the whole exhibit is the story of Confucius, the great inspirational teacher and moral leader that is still highly regarded in China today,” Turner said.
Each space is full of interactive activities for kids. At the restaurant they cook in a wok using bamboo tools, learn about the tea ceremony and try picking up fake food using chopsticks. It exposes kids to traditional Chinese spoons and bowls that are very different from Western counterparts, and teaches the importance of a healthy meal by making kids think about what they’re eating.
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“It keeps very much in theme with what we love to do, to teach children or expose children to the fact that we’re all the same in many, many ways,” Turner said. “We just may do things differently and have different things around us.”
The market is similar to the museum’s permanent Whole Foods Market exhibit, letting kids shop for fish, fruits and vegetables. It teaches roleplaying, sharing and the math skills employed in counting, sorting and weighing.
“What the children are seeing is that this is like going to the grocery store they’ve got, except that it’s set up differently and has different produce,” Turner said.
At the school section, kids learn how Chinese words are created by combining characters that each have their own meaning — like the characters for tree and wood coming together to form forest. They can try to write Chinese characters and match them to English words. Turner’s favorite section is the panda reserve, which compliments the museum’s permanent Pet Vet and Baby Nursery areas. Kids don a veterinary jacket, weigh and feed stuffed panda cubs, and assign them names using the Chinese characters.
Another component that’s sure to be popular is a Chinese dragon costume, which kids can don with the help of staff and go on parade. The museum is working with the Chicago Chinese American Council and Chinese Consulate to come up with appropriate activities to celebrate the Chinese New Year on Jan. 28.
“It’s a gorgeous exhibit,” Turner said. “It’s very rich in its activities with all the elements we look for with the richness of language, math, social-emotional learning, roleplaying. It’s really beautifully done.”
‘Children’s China: Celebrating Culture, Character and Confucius’
When: Jan. 20-April 25
Where: Kohl Children’s Museum, 2100 Patriot Blvd., Glenview
Admission: $12; $11 for seniors; free for infants
Information: 847-832-6600; kohlchildrensmuseum.org