The brand, spanking new Storyland exhibit at Kohl Children’s Museum is touchable, wonderful, eye-opening fun. If your kids know all the books or just one, they’ll love the interactivity that lets them touch what they’ve only imagined as you’ve read their favorite books.
The exhibit uses the plots from seven kiddie lit books—including some you’ve already memorized—and finds ways to make them interactive:
- Play with Spot from “Where’s Spot?”
- Explore Mr. McGregor’s garden from “The Tale of Peter Rabbit.”Â
- Crunch through the snow of “The Snowy Day.”
- Mix a batch of cookies with Mouse from “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie.”
- Soar over Manhattan and climb through the Statue of Liberty with Rosalba and her grandmother from “Abuela.”
- Learn how time and frogs fly in “Tuesday.”
Whether you or your kids can recite every word in each of the seven books by heart, or are just learning of some of these titles now, won’t alter the experience. The books are available at each station to read with your child first or let him or her read aloud.
There are also tips for parents about how to make reading as important as baths in the everyday schedule, just more exciting.Â
The best parts of Storyland are the reminders to let books inspire everyday play.
Read the books at home
- “Abuela” by Arthur Dorros
- “Chicka Chicka Boom Boom” by Bill Martin Jr. & John Archambault
- “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie” by Laura Numeroff
- “The Snowy Day” by Ezra Jack Keats
- “The Tale of Peter Rabbit” by Beatrix Potter
- “Tuesday” by David Wiesner
- “Where’s Spot” by Eric Hill
If you go
Open through Jan. 13. The audio and visuals are in English and Spanish.
Kohl Children’s Museum, 2100 Patriot Boulevard, Glenview
$13 kids and adults, free babies under 12 months
This article originally appeared in the November 2018 issue of Chicago Parent. Read the rest of the issue.
