Beltway Bambinos

Explore! Children’s Museum has launched the Explore! Sandbox, a free database with over 100 virtual, interactive and hands-on activities for children up to nine years old that compiles the best activities and experiences from top children’s museums, art and science museums, and more across the country. In a time when more families are home together, the Sandbox aims to inspire creativity, play and connectivity while catering to children’s individual interests.

The Explore! Sandbox is child-friendly, safe for browsing, and includes non-traditional museum activities like dance and cooking lessons – that allow parents to create connections with their children. Select activities have been aggregated from other leading museums like The City Museum of Manhattan and The Miami Children’s Museum, and from museums around the world like the Tate Gallery in London, giving families access to an exploratorium of experiences available digitally. 

Activities featured on The Sandbox aim to help visitors reimagine what meaningful, at-home experiences look like and guide parents to connect with their children in new ways. Experiences are divided into seven different categories – Arts, Food, Movement, Performance, Science & Nature, Storytime, and Explore! More, and range from interactive activities and play to hands-on projects. In line with the museum’s mission to inspire children to be curious thinkers and communicators, and challenge children to ask questions about the world around them, the Sandbox also includes resources for parents to talk about difficult topics, such as racism and COVID-19, at home.

The Sandbox website is the latest installment from the Explore! Children’s Museum, which currently runs an exhibit in the National Portrait Gallery and a traveling experience known as Mission Mobile that serves students throughout the DMV. While a brick-and-mortar children’s museum is forthcoming to the Fort Totten neighborhood, the Explore! Sandbox is the next chapter in the vision to build an online community ahead of the new physical museum.

ABOUT EXPLORE! CHILDREN’S MUSEUM
Explore! Children’s Museum, a private 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, is dedicated to serving children birth through age 10 in the District of Columbia, Virginia, and Maryland. The mission of Explore! is to inspire children to be curious thinkers, creators, communicators, and collaborators. In early 2017 Explore! and the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery opened an interactive children’s museum experience inside the Portrait Gallery. For more information click here.

Recent posts
Virtual summer camp
Toys and games that are educational
Subscription boxes for children