Note: As of this writing the Minnesota Children’s Museum is temporarily closed due to the Covid-19 Pandemic. However, things are changing weekly so be sure to check their website.

We are big fans of children’s museums. Since both of us are instructional designers we love seeing different ways kids can learn through experiences. So we were excited once Lucy was reasonably old enough for us to take her to the Minnesota Children’s Museum in St. Paul.

What You Will Do at the Minnesota Children’s Museum

There is a lot to do at the Minnesota Children’s Museum, more than I could reasonably describe in this post. I will try to give you the highlights for us. We went with a young toddler, Lucy was about 18 months old at the time. There is a wide variety of activities at the museum so kids of all ages enjoy going there.

Sorry if this post is a little thin on visuals, we were having so much fun we didn’t take a lot of photos!

Sprouts Toddler Area

For obvious reasons the Sprouts toddler area in the museum was one of our favorite parts. This room is exclusively for little kids which is a nice reprieve from the wildness of older children in other spaces.

Lucy had so much fun playing here. There is a toddler sized play-set with bridge and slide. Mirrors with bumpy walk ways in front of them. A little water area for experimenting with water flowing. And a tree story and dress up area made out of books!

The Scramble

The scramble is the Minnesota Children’s Museum indoor playground area. Not nearly as big as nearby Edinborough Park, of course, but really impressive for inside the museum. Lucy was too little at this point to climb all the way up through the two story structure, but there was a toddler part of the scramble too. She had lots of fun playing on the slide in this area.

Our World

Like many children’s museums the Minnesota Children’s Museum has an area dedicated to being a town or city. The Our World area is really cool with a lot of different occupation areas like a farm, bank, fire station, and grocery store. They also had the most advanced post office set up I have ever seen in a museum! Lucy was not super interested in this area at 18 months, but I know this would probably be one of her favorite places now.

Forces at Play

This was Meagan’s favorite area of the whole museum. It is set up to look like a giant car wash. In it you get to experiment with forces like water, air, and gravity. There are ball launchers, and tube walls, and fans to blow paratroopers. Of course there is also the main event which is the car wash itself!

Sum Up

There are still lots of areas at the Minnesota Children’s Museum that I did not tell you about, including the rotating exhibit space which is normally themed around an educational television show (Wild Kratts when we were there). This is a museum not to miss on your trip to the twin cities. Kids have tons of fun here and can’t help but learn something while they are playing.