Passage
For one week each summer an empty storefront downtown becomes a museum for children. Volunteers fill it with hands-on exhibits about light, motion, and sound. The corner1, which the giant kaleidoscope stands is the busiest in the museum. The museum’s founder2 a science teacher who missed her old classroom dreamed it up three years ago.
Setting up the museum takes a full week. The crew of teenage helpers 3 arrange the tables and tests each display. The 4 childrens’ laughter fills the room by the second day. The exhibits hand out puzzles and tools, and 5 they often solve a riddle before lunch. 6
The best exhibits invite children to touch. At one table a child spins a wheel, watches the colors blur, and 7 guessing what will happen next. Each exhibit is based 8 off of a simple idea children can grasp. The point is discovery, not memorizing facts.
Not everything works on the first try. A display can jam or a bulb can burn 9 out, a volunteer is always nearby to fix it. Children ask endless questions10 and the helpers do their best to answer. The noise is part of the fun.
At first only a few families stopped by. 11 However, for a while no one was sure the museum would draw a crowd at all. Many of the children 12 have never seen a museum exhibit up close before they came. By Friday the little museum 13 was busy with questions and laughter.
When the week ended, the volunteers packed the exhibits into boxes for next year. Children left asking when the museum would come back. 14 What had been an empty storefront had become, for one week, the most exciting room in town. 15
