Finding family fun this summer in Topeka doesn’t have to be expensive! Topeka has a bevy of free activities that it offers during the summer to keep your kids active, learning and even eating nutritional meals. In this blog, you’ll find a wide assortment of different no-cost activities.
The Kansas Children’s Discovery Center is throwing a little shade at its guests in 2022.
That’s because the Discovery Center on Friday, May 13, unveiled a new, scaly roof on its Reptilian Pavilion that offers a cool place to play during the summer. The project began in 2020, with students from the University of Kansas School of Architecture and Design starting to design the pavilion. Construction began during spring 2021 with the base structure, and was then completed this spring by eight KU architecture students and presented to the public during an informal open house.
The student volunteers originally planned to use terra cotta tiles for the roof, according to KU associate professor Keith Van de Riet, but decided to instead go with recycled, aluminum traffic signs that were shaped to look like scales by the students. Van de Riet oversaw the project, as well as the New Years Pavilion that was constructed by another group of KU architecture students and unveiled in February 2022.
The Kansas Children’s Discovery Center got a helping hand from a great group of volunteers from the Evergy Green Team on Tuesday, March 29.
The volunteers spent several hours cutting down problematic trees, laying mulch at the Chinese New Years Pavilion and dragon sculpture, clearing excessive brush and removing rocks, wood beams and other debris to make the Discovery Center’s Certified “Nature Explore” Outdoor Classroom a safe, visually appealing area for children and their families to learn, grow and play.
Evergy has been a big supporter of the Kansas Children’s Discovery Center for many years. It provided considerable funding and volunteers for a project that involved making the Discovery Center’s pond and stream more interactive and safe, helped oversee a recent prescribed burn of the Discovery Center’s prairie restoration habitat, constructed the Discovery Center’s original Epic Sandbox in 2017 and has donated to help fund many of the Discovery Center’s great educational programs.
The Green Team itself is a group of employees and retiree volunteers that has taken on environmental projects across Kansas and Missouri since 1989. The team completes 50 to 70 projects per year, mostly on weekends and evenings, according to its website. The Green Team collaborates with conservation groups, agencies and schools in enhancing and fostering an understanding of the Kansas and Missouri environment, as well as improving natural habitats and helping provide access to important environmental areas.
Kansas Children’s Discovery Center offers high-quality, interactive experiences to inspire a lifelong love of learning for every child. Volunteers support our mission by creating these memorable experiences for every family that walks through our doors. Volunteers engage children in fun, educational activities, pitch in at special events, maintain our outdoor space and keep exhibit areas ready for play. If your organization is interested in a fun volunteer day at the Kansas Children’s Discovery Center, call our volunteer coordinator at (785) 783-8300. We have indoor and outdoor projects for any size group.
Thank you, Evergy Green Team!
MORE VOLUNTEER NEWS: Read more about future educators from TCALC volunteering their time here.
A tightly knit group of high school students from Topeka Unified School District 501 have been volunteering their time and energy to make the Kansas Children’s Discovery Center a better place for its young visitors, as well as honing their skills as potential future educators.
These six student leaders are members of the Topeka Center for Advanced Learning and Careers, or TCALC — an innovative program created through business partnerships to help teach youths about different career pathways they are interested in following. TCALC has several different professional pathways it offers to students, with this group representing the teaching pathway.
“These students are juniors and seniors in high school,” said Diane Kimsey, elementary math consulting teacher for TCALC. “They represent Highland Park, Topeka High and Topeka West. We meet every day for half a day and they all think that perhaps they would like to be teachers eventually. We have those who want to work with elementary, we have middle school dreamers and we have high school dreamers.”
So far in the four weeks they have been volunteering at the Discovery Center, the students have helped clean up the Discovery Center’s outdoor nature area, as well as creating educational materials for children. Last Wednesday, March 2, they taught young visitors of the Discovery Center about engineering using Rigamajig Basic Builder kits.
“Covid has kept us from being in the classrooms as much as we’d like to be, but at the same time we’ve had incredible opportunities,” Kimsey said. “For the last month, we’ve been here (at the Discovery Center) on Wednesdays, and we’re looking forward to this partnership to continue through the rest of the school year.”
The students came to the Discovery Center after contacting Visit Topeka to support Topeka Dino Days, a communitywide dinosaur exhibition. Staff at Visit Topeka connected the educators to the Discovery Center to support the museum as they opened the traveling Tiny Titans: Dinosaur Eggs and Babies.
The Kansas Children's Discovery Center's native prairie grass and wildflower habitat underwent a prescribed burn on Monday, Feb. 14.
Burns are a natural process for helping control unwanted plant growth, called fuel, from invasive species such as bush honeysuckle or tree saplings, along with fertilizing the soil and promoting regeneration and species diversity. It also opens up space with the taller plants out of the way for sunlight to hit the smaller vegetation as it takes root. Some seeds only germinate under the presence of fire and other disturbances. The process is done once about every three years.
As required by law, the Discovery Center obtained a permit to conduct the burn, which was overseen by Evergy's Green Team, Shawnee County Parks + Recreation, Gage Park Police and the Discovery Center's Prairie Team.
Safety precautions were taken to prevent the burn from getting out of control or bystanders from getting too close, including cordoning off the sitewalk near the fire, separating the prairie into sections to prevent the fire from getting too large, watering down areas where fire could cause damage to the building and raking up leaves and other debris where needed.
Loose trash that had been caught in the thick vegetation was removed and thrown away prior to the burn, as well. An unintended benefit of the prairie habitat is that it acts as a natural catch-all for loose trash, preventing it from blowing into neighboring areas and making it easier to collect. However, we ask that all patrons throw away any trash in one of two trash bins located in the parking lot prior to leaving to help keep the prairie looking beautiful.
The fire teams also lit the prairie grasses from the south against the prevailing northerly wind, a method called back burning that causes a slower, more manageable burn.
The Discovery Center's Prairie Team plans to add pollinator seeds and plants to the soil and expect to see more beautiful vegetation popping up again as early as this spring.
We want to thank Evergy, Shawnee County Parks + Recreation, Gage Park Police and Vivien Smith for their efforts in making the burn a safe and successful event.
The Kansas Children’s Discovery Center unveiled a new feature this month.
Thanks to the generosity of the Lei family, and the hard work of some talented college students, the Discovery Center was able to replace its old pavilion with a New Years Pavilion that blends a beautiful yet informative design to help people of all ages learn about East Asian culture. A pavilion previously on the site was dedicated in 2013 with support from family and friends in memory of Garbo Lei. The new pavilion will enhance the existing Garbo Lei Family Treasure Garden.
Eighteen students from the University of Kansas School of Architecture worked together to design and build the pavilion, which included utilizing design elements that the donor had requested. The structure was built with wood, steel and terra cotta materials.
“A good detail we did is the center is the Chinese lunar calendar, so it’s got all twelve animals on it that (each) represent one year,” said Ashlyn Reece, a third-year student at the architecture school.
A new program with a special guest educator will help get kids playing outside.
Fresh Air Fridays will take place each Friday at the Kansas Children’s Discovery Center, with special guest educator Farai Harreld leading instruction on the second and fourth Fridays of each month with Discovery Center educators leading on the other days. Harreld is a post-partum doula, folk herbalist, urban homesteader, writer and caregiver. She was born in Zimbabwe and raised in Botswana before moving to Kansas. She is an educator on topics ranging from plants, motherhood, food, race, fashion, gardening and more and runs Faraiharreld.com.
The programs will take place rain or shine, as outdoor play is an essential part of a child’s day. Open spaces give the freedom to run, leap, explore, take risks and make memories. Play will be guided, and there will be different themes each month.
There is no additional cost to attend other than regular admission, which is $9 for children and adults, $8 for seniors and free for infants under 12 months and Discovery Center members. Admission also lets you play all day at the Kansas Children’s Discovery Center.
According to the National Association for the Education of Young Children, outdoor play is vital to children’s growth for a number of reasons. It invites children to learn science through exploration, creates opportunities for social interaction and collaboration and also promotes physical health through exercise while helping to build motor skills. Additionally, outdoor play promotes better sleep, gives children a chance to take appropriate risks and leads to better learning outcomes once children return to other activities. Perhaps most importantly, it anchors children to the real world.
Playing in the elements is also an important part of the program, as weather is an important part of growing as a child. For instance, playing in the rain or snow helps with a child’s motor skills and balance and exposes them to different sensory experiences.
Other benefits of outdoor play include getting plenty of Vitamin D through sunlight to help stabilize a child’s mood and boost their immune system and giving them an appreciation of nature that they might not have otherwise gained being inside.
The Discovery Center has an abundance of opportunities for children to learn and play outside with several outdoor design features, including a 4.5-acre certified Nature Explore Outdoor Classroom and a native prairie grass and wildflower habitat. The Discovery Center also has installed several outdoor play spaces at parks and community centers across Topeka, as well as one in Marysville, Kan., that features design elements inspired by the city’s history.
For those looking for more ways to get their kids outdoors instead of sitting in front of a screen all day, another great resource is 1000 Hours Outside, a global movement to get kids playing out in nature for at least 1,000 hours of outside activity a year. The website offers free, downloadable tracker sheets to keep a record of how many hours kids are outside each day, as well as a free pack of outdoor activity prompts for each month of the year to help motivate you to get outside with fun activities. There is also an official 1000 Hours Outside app for both Apple or Android products, as well as other merchandise to help aid in outdoor activities.
The Discovery Center’s gift shop also offers merchandise that can help promote outside play, including butterfly nets, penguin and polar bear ear muffs, water bottles and other outdoor-related items.
