A Playground for Children-s Minds

Six days a week, from morning till sundown, the halls of the Bernard M. Bloomfield Science Museum are filled with happy children skipping from exhibit to exhibit, pushing buttons, watching demonstrations, activating machines, wonders materializing before their eyes. And, incidentally and simultaneously, they are learning about the laws of science. "The museum is based on principles of change and movement," explains Professor Peter Hillman of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, under whose direction the museum came into being. "By touching the exhibits and watching what happens, our visitors can find out for themselves how a tornado forms, how birds and airplanes fly, and what turns a lighted stick into a magic wand."

Youngsters from kindergarteners to high school seniors, also learn about everyday phenomena why their umbrellas invert on a windy day, what causes the whirlpool in their bathtub and more. All exhibits are hands-on, and are accompanied by written explanations in Hebrew, Arabic and English.

Each year, some 140,000 visitors from every part of the country one-third of them school groups enjoy the changing exhibitions. Since the museum's inauguration in 1992, exhibits have dealt with subjects such as light and electricity, duplication in nature, telecommunications, sensory perception of motion, why buildings remain standing and more. The summer 1998 exhibition was "Sensing and Sensors"; winter and spring 1999 exhibitions are devoted to "Perception: Factors Influencing Seeing." In-service training sessions for teachers, afternoon enrichment groups for young children and a workshop for construction of models by older children are also available. During the summer months, a science day camp is in operation. Many young visitors who come to the museum frequently, earn the title "science ambassadors"; their task is to promote scientific awareness among their peers.

"If all youngsters learn by enjoyment, this applies even more to children with disabilities," explains Ronit Barnachuk-Halevi, in charge of the museum's instructors. She adds that the museums instructors derive much satisfaction from teaching these "special" children: physically handicapped, blind, deaf, brain-damaged and emotionally disturbed. The welcome reception of the handicapped is a very important part of the museum's program. For the benefit of the blind, fourteen displays are currently being equipped with oral explanations, and sections of a science newsletter, "Two Minutes to the Year 2000, " published by the museum, appear in Braille.

One winter day, the museum was unusually quiet for two hours. Why? A group of 31 teenagers from a special Tel Aviv school visited the museum. Some wore hearing aids, and others were totally deaf. But that did not prevent them from paying close attention and asking questions as a museum instructor explained and demonstrated the properties of air; their own teacher translated explanations, questions and answers into sign language. As with all special groups, the teacher confers with the instructor before they arrive at the museum, and they are divided into groups of ten while other children are divided into groups of 15-20.

Altogether some 200 groups with disabilities about 2000 individuals come for Hebrew tours of the museum annually. Also some 1,300 Arabic-speaking children visit the museum each year.

Another major project of the Jerusalem Science Museum is its outreach program. Three traveling exhibitions make their way each year to dozens of outlying development towns and villages. "This year we had particular success in the Negev town of Arad," says Dafna Efron of the museum staff. "The local schools invited children from a Bedouin school to join them for three weeks of great excitement." In addition, the museum treated the town's teachers to a refresher course on methods for stimulating children to solve the riddles of science. In this way, todays playgrounds for the mind become training grounds for tomorrow.