Kids get connected with 'Tubes' exhibit

They might not realize it, but kids at DuPage Children's Museum's newest permanent exhibit are learning principals that will help them in school.

“It's all about physics — force, velocity and motion,” said Alison Segebarth, director of marketing and membership.

Part of the museum's Make it Move area, “Tubes and Tunnels” opened in June after about six months of planning. Developed by the museum, the exhibit lets kids connect clear plastic tubes, hang them on bright red-, blue- and turquoise-colored metal pegs and other structures of varying heights, and watch how the arrangement affects the movement of the balls.

“We wanted to think about appealing to our older children,” said Peter Crabbe, associate director of exhibits and design. “The very young like it in here, too. They'll hold a tube, put a ball in and watch it go down.”

Along with wrapping their tubes around pegs, assistant marketing manager Dana Peters said kids sometimes just like to wrap the tubes around themselves.

“It's fun to see what they do with it,” she said.

Kids who want to drop balls into tubes from higher elevations can crank the balls up a conveyor belt, complete with a mirror that shows the ball's progress. The museum also plans to add more step stools so kids can hang tubes higher. After the balls have finished their travels, kids gather them up in plastic baskets and bring them back to the start.

“Tubes and Tunnels” was added as the final part of a renovation of Make it Move done in May 2010. It replaces a roller coaster that had been there for a decade and needed a lot of adult facilitation to work.

“It didn't have the same free form nature this has,” Crabbe said. “This was an opportunity to put something new and fresh in.”

The museum's facilitators rotate through the exhibits, including “Tubes and Tunnels,” where they encourage kids to try new things. A plastic scooper and a spinning rotor are attached to the walls and kids are challenged to try to arrange their tubes so that the balls will land there.

The $19,000 exhibit went through extensive testing before it opened. Volunteers were trained to collect field notes, providing objective observations to the designers.

“Until you see the families and kids using things, you're not sure if you're hitting the right mark,” Crabbe said.

The observations led staff members to add stands that can be moved throughout the area and used to prop up tubes where there aren't permanent objects nearby.

The exhibit is still being evaluated, and while Crabbe said they haven't seen any major changes that need to be made, they may make the conveyor belt taller to allow kids to create even more impressive tube structures.

“Tubes and Tunnels”

<b>Where: </b>DuPage Children's Museum, 301 N. Washington St., Naperville, (630) 637-8000; dupagechildrensmuseum.org

<b>Hours: </b>9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday; 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday; noon to 5 p.m. Sunday

<b>Admission: </b>$9.50; $8.50 for seniors