Portable planetarium will come to Weiser in August

The Children’s Museum of Idaho (CMI) made a stop at the Weiser Library on Friday.

 Through the nonprofit organization’s Museum on the Move outreach program, local kids were given the opportunity to explore their science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) skills at no charge.

 Friends of the Library sold hotdogs on the front lawn during the event, which ran from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

 “Museum on the Move is based in Meridian and we’ve been open for four years,” said CMI Program Manager Erin Brown, who grew up in Weiser, but has lived in Boise since graduating from Weiser High School. 

 “We were the first one in Idaho,” she said. “The idea is purposeful play. You walk in and we have different exhibits, like a pizza that is pretend, but kids are making the pizzas, and we have a little store with shopping carts, and a rocket. 

 We work a lot with NASA, so it’s a lot of STEM, exploring different things and trying to spark new ideas. It’s just kids exploring with their grownup.”

 The Children’s Museum of Idaho is located at 790 S. Progress Ave. in Meridian and is open Monday through Saturday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and 1-5 p.m. on Sundays. Cost is $10 for adults and children 24 months and older.

 The visit is worth the drive, the large facility filled with 34 exhibits that “ignite curiosity, inspire wonder, fuel creativity, and spark imagination.” Kids are offered the opportunity to explore engineering and construction through its Imagination Station Blocks, to learn about dinosaurs, fossils, and rocks, visit the Tech Play Lab, engage in critical thinking games, experiment with planes and parachutes using a wind tunnel, and much more.

 The organization is currently expanding its building, the extra 4,000-square feet to include a planetarium and additional exhibits such as broadcasting science, gravity cars, and a gift shop.

Portable planetarium

 But you won’t have to drive to Boise to experience the planetarium because Museum on the Move is bringing a portable unit to Weiser on Wednesday, Aug. 16. The inflatable unit features a dome-shaped projection screen that makes celestial objects appear and move in a realistic way to imitate the night sky.

 “It’s big; it takes up about half a gymnasium, so we will have it at the Vendome,” Brown said. “You can fit about 25 people inside. I’ll give a talk, and it’s going to be really cool.”

 She said that part of CMI’s intent is to bring some of its assets to rural communities where some may find it difficult or inconvenient to visit the Meridian location.

 “Museum on the Move goes to libraries, schools, and communities; I grew up in Weiser and would go to Boise once a year, and I know a lot of kids can’t come to us, so we go to them,” Brown said. “My husband grew up in Council, so we are farm kids.”

 More information about the portable planetarium coming to Weiser in August will be provided in a future issue of the Signal American.

 For information on CMI and the Museum on the Move outreach program, visit www.cmidaho.org, call (208) 345-1920 or visit the organization’s Facebook page.  

 For more information about the Weiser Library, visit www.weiserlibrary.net, call (208) 549-1243, or visit its Facebook page.