The 5 best kids' museums in Washington, D.C.
10th Street and Constitution Avenue NW. 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. naturalhistory.si.edu. Free (except the Butterfly Pavilion, which is $7-$8 on every day but Tuesday).
The National Museum of Natural History is home to a lot of bones, from the skeleton of a giant ground sloth in the “Deep Time” exhibit to the South American bullfrog in the Bone Hall. But there are also plenty of living creatures in this museum devoted to the natural world, whose collection includes an astonishing 147 million specimens and artifacts.
“Everything is at kids’ eye level,” says Donna Tuggle, the museum’s chief of visitor experience, school and youth programs, as she points out Madagascar hissing cockroaches in the habitats in the very popular Insect Zoo — right near a life-size reproduction of a termite mound that kids can crawl through. Things that kids can touch and explore are found throughout the exhibits, like a reproduction of a mine in the Geology, Gems and Minerals Hall that leads to glow-in-the-dark minerals. This museum will have kids wide-eyed as they check out ancient mummies, a giant squid and the Hope Diamond.
Don’t miss: Kids can walk into an otherworldly garden full of 300 colorful butterflies in flight and observe them up close (without touching them) in the Butterfly Pavilion, an experience that costs $8 for adults and $7 for kids and seniors. Budding paleontologists will make a beeline for the newish David H. Koch Hall of Fossils - Deep Time to see skeletons like a Tyrannosaurus rex, plus dinosaur dioramas and scientists at work uncovering specimens in the FossiLab. Families can check for programming like “Play Date at NMNH” for kids up to age 3 or “The World & Me” for kids ages 3 to 9. These events are often held in the museum’s Q?rius learning space, which has its own collection of more than 6,000 objects — many of which kids can touch and explore.
Insider tip: The Butterfly Pavilion is free on Tuesdays (you’ll need to be at the museum to pick up tickets at 10 a.m. or 1:45 p.m.).
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