The Pittsburgh chapter of Autism Speaks! hosted an Autism Awareness Day at the Chilren's Museum on March 21, 2010. Approximately 160 individuals attended.

See photos from the event on Facebook at www.facebook.com/pittsburghkids

A comment from Ellen Cicconi, a parent and an Autism Speaks! board member:
This was the first time our family had visited the Children's Museum, and while I used to say we didn't go because it was too far and we didn't have time, the fact is, taking 2 kids with autism to public places can be sort of tough. My boys absolutely LOVED the museum. We can't wait to visit again. The staff were great with the kids, and there is just so much cool, fun sensory stuff to do, we can't stay away. Thank you Children's Museum! and Autism Speaks!

Performances

Cultural organizations collaborate with the Museum to entertain and educate visitors through performances in music, dance, art, puppet theater and natural science. Featured groups include Artists Image Resource, Carnegie Museum of Art, Carnegie Museum of Natural History, Civic Light Opera, Dance Alloy, Family Arts Theater, Mattress Factory, Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, Pittsburgh Opera and Prime Stage Theatre Company.

Special Programs

Each year the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh presents several special events for Museum visitors with the assistance of local education-based organizations and private funders.

• Join us in August for the annual Kindergarten...Here I Come event at the Children's Museum of Pittsburgh. Geared towards celebrating your child's entrance into kindergarten, the event lets children ride on a school bus, make art projects, be on a live radio broadcast, enjoy storytelling, and much more. Kindergarten children will receive a book, t-shirt, and DVD to help them commemorate this special occasion (Quantities are limited.)

Artists in Residence

By cultivating relationships with local and national artists, the Museum encourages artists to collaborate with children while introducing visitors to their work. Support provided by The Heinz Endowment’s Creative Heights program and the Multicultural Arts Initiative.

Youth Programs

The Museum's YouthALIVE! program collaborates with local groups and organizations throughout the year including:

• Earth Force, an environmental awareness program that helps students to appreciate and learn more about their environment while encouraging ways they can help.
• Allegheny Intermediate Unit’s BUSTED! Program, an anti-smoking program for teens that uses creative methods to increase the awareness of the harmful effects of tobacco.
• Pittsburgh Humane Society offers instruction on dog safety.
• Family Links (SLB) provides lessons in both team and character building through use of puppets.
• Neighboring venues the Mattress Factory and Andy Warhol Museum host workshops for Youth ArtWorks students.
• Allegheny General Hospital, for which YA! students provide get-well cards and tissue paper flowers for pediatric and elderly patients.

Thanks to an ongoing partnership with the Arts Education Collaborative, the Museum is able to offer professional development credit for teacher workshops and classes. The AEC also assists with data collection and analysis, ensuring that the Children’s Museum continues to provide quality programming for educators.

Take Home a Book

The Children’s Museum has developed a unique lending library project with the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh to display a wide assortment of age-appropriate books throughout the Museum. The books highlight topics of many of our exhibit areas and provide stories, history, activities and fun facts for children and families. Visitors can enjoy these books at the Museum or sign them out to read at home and return to the Museum or any branch of the Carnegie Library.  This is the first program of its kind at a children’s museum. The program is supported by the Claire Thomas Book Fund and the Anne V. Lewis Book Fund.

Explore More

The Children’s Museum offers website visitors a unique feature – a list of great books and websites to further explore the topics found in our new exhibits. Visitors can link to the Carnegie Library to reserve the books online. This program is made possible by a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services.

Tickets for Kids Charities brings the wonder and magic of live arts & cultural, educational, sporting, and family entertainment venues and events to lower-income children and their families by distributing tickets to hundreds of nonprofit social service agencies and community groups that chaperone the children and their families to the venues and events.

Children's Museum of Pittsburgh has provided tickets for Tickets for Kids since March 1999, benefitting more than 13,000 children. Alternately, for the past 10 years Tickets for Kids has supplied tickets for monthly field trips for the Museum's YouthALIVE! After School Club.

The Children’s Museum joined efforts with the Warhol Museum to help restore the North Side’s New Hazlett Theater in 2005. The theater reopened in September 2006 with financial help from the state. The Children’s Museum contributes to the theater's varied and innovative performances.

Each month local experts in child development are invited to present informal sessions for parents and caregivers in the Nursery, the Museum’s young child exhibit area. The Child Development Series sessions are free with Museum admission through the sponsorship of Giant Eagle.

Check the Calendar of Events for details on the sessions offered this month.

The Museum continues a lengthy collaboration with Pittsburgh Public Schools by hosting the All City Art Show for elementary and middle school students each year, working closely with individual schools in the district, participating in professional development opportunities for district teachers, and partnering with two Pre-K classrooms located here in the Children’s Museum.

The Children's Museum has expanded the idea of collaboration for the benefit of children by devoting over 30,000 square feet of space in its expanded facility for rental to other child-focused organizations working on child advocacy, education/research, literacy and the arts.

Learn more about our partners by clicking here.