FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: June 28, 2024
Language development through play at new Cincinnati Museum Center exhibit
Kids' Town Park builds early love of reading and pathway to literacy for kids and adults
CINCINNATI – Cincinnati Museum Center (CMC) is giving the region’s youngest learners a new place to learn through play. A new language development exhibit in CMC’s Children’s Museum turns words into building blocks for curiosity, generosity and empathy.
Kids’ Town Park will help early learners ages 6 and under explore literacy through play. An interactive pond projection teaches verbs as worms wriggle and butterflies flutter. A street library turns letter cards into a giant see-and-say. And an emotions wheel helps name feelings to nurture social-emotional learning. The vibrant, park-themed early literacy gallery is the museum’s newest permanent exhibit and the newest addition to The Children’s Museum.
“Language and literacy skills are the foundation of intellectual and emotional development. Research shows that children who are exposed to 30 million words in an intentional, meaningful way before age 3 are set up for future success,” said Elizabeth Pierce, president & CEO of Cincinnati Museum Center. “With Kids’ Town Park, we’re equipping kids and their adults with the curiosity and skills to surpass that number and to build positive habits they’ll carry with them the rest of their lives.”
Research by early literacy experts, preschool directors and pediatricians has shown that language gaps can appear as early as 18 months. These gaps, resulting from hearing fewer words during those critical early months of language development, impact future reading comprehension and overall academic, social and professional development. However, exposing children to a variety of words early and often helps develop vocabulary, reading comprehension, social-emotional skills, math and spatial skills and even generosity.
Kids’ Town Park encourages kids and adults to experience the space together. Rotating character cubes invite you to tell a funny story using six characters you can mix and match. Will you put a toucan’s head on a tiger’s body as it walks on crocodile legs? You can also connect spoken with heard words by speaking to the talking tree and hearing your words repeated back to you in a different voice. A giant see-and-say connects letters and words with pictures as it reads the letter and picture out loud with a focus on phonics.
The new addition to The Children’s Museum also uses art to support literacy development. An art in the park station encourages you to create your own story using pieces of felt cut into familiar and abstract shapes. As kids and adults talk about the story together, they’re using three important cues to provide a rich language environment: tuning in to each other, talking about what they’re doing and taking turns to development conversation patterns.
Kids’ Town Park has space for the earliest language learners, too. Mirrors, textured shapes and tactile letters create moments of discovery and engagement between kids and adults as every ooh and ahh becomes a steppingstone to forming words. Every word the child hears is a building block to how they learn about the world around them.
Kids’ Town Park is now open in The Children’s Museum at Cincinnati Museum Center.
Support from the James J. and Joan A. Gardner Family Foundation, TriHealth, the State of Ohio and the Ohio Facilities Construction Commission made this exhibit possible.
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About Cincinnati Museum Center
Cincinnati Museum Center (CMC) at Union Terminal is a nationally recognized, award-winning institution housed in a National Historic Landmark. CMC is a vital community resource that sparks curiosity, inspiration, epiphany and dialogue. CMC was awarded the 2009 National Medal for Museum and Library Service from the Institute of Museum and Library Services and received accreditation from the American Alliance of Museums in 2012, one of a select few museums in the nation to receive both honors. Organizations within CMC include the Cincinnati History Museum, Museum of Natural History & Science, The Children’s Museum, Robert D. Lindner Family OMNIMAX® Theater, Cincinnati History Library and Archives and the Geier Collections and Research Center. Housed in historic Union Terminal – a National Historic Landmark restored in 2018 and recognized as the nation’s 45th most important building by the American Institute of Architects – CMC welcomes more than 1.8 million visits annually, making it one of the most visited museums in the country. For more information, visit cincymuseum.org.