BOOTHEEL YOUTH MUSEUM'S TRAVELING EXHIBIT COMES TO TOWN

While most children are dreaming of bursts of fire in the night sky on the Fourth of July, other area youths will be learning about magic in the world of science.

The Bootheel Youth Museum in Malden will bring its traveling show to Cape Girardeau Saturday through Wednesday.

It will first open at the Arena Building on Saturday from 9:30 a.m to 6 p.m.

On Monday, the exhibit will move to the Cape Girardeau Civic Center and remain there through Wednesday. Hours will be 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Donna Vandiver, education coordinator for the museum, calls the discovery center an experiment in "edutainment."

She said the organization is dedicated to bringing hands-on learning to children throughout the region.

"The exhibits encourage exploration and experience. It's learn-by-doing activities," Vandiver said.

The traveling museum has about 30 hands-on exhibits and none of them are part of the main museum in Malden.

"The traveling museum serves to entice people to visit the real museum," Vandiver said. "People are usually pleasantly surprised. They think they don't like science until they start looking at it on a child-like level. Then they are fascinated."

The museum is designed to encourage a child's learning through their natural curiosity about how things work. The exhibits are intended to be used as an informal learning tool and show kids learning can be fun, she said.

The exhibits in the traveling museum were built and designed on site at the Bootheel Youth Museum by Dr. Ray Vandiver, executive director of the museum.

Some of the exhibits include a Sewer Pipe Symphony which shows how pitch changes with length of pipes and a stuffed three-foot doll that allows kids to look at how organs fit inside the human body.

Civic Center volunteer Anthony Wade said when the exhibits are moved to the Civic Center they will be staffed by volunteers.