Great River Children’s Museum Blog - Great River Children's Museum

Becky’s Mission and Vision for Central Minnesota

Becky Coborn is one of the first people to join the children’s museum project. In 2013, she began working as a licensed parent educator in ECFE (Early Childhood Family Education) in Sauk Rapids-Rice School District. Her own children were grown and flown from the nest and she felt compelled to invest in the children of her community, their parents and families. She completed her master’s degree in Child and Family Studies from St. Cloud State University in 2016. For her thesis project, Becky researched the impact of children’s museums on parents in communities. She found that children’s museums help parents to better understand child development and how to encourage their child’s learning.

Becky has a deep love for the St. Cloud area and a desire to see our community thrive. While raising her children, she served as a volunteer in many different capacities at Sacred Heart Elementary School, Cathedral High School, College of St. Benedict and St. John’s University. She strongly believes that building a children’s museum is the next best step for Central Minnesota.

Becky understands that the early years are a crucial stage in a child’s growth and development. Having a place for families to come where kids can be free to play, explore and try new skills in a safe, rich learning environment will have long-term benefits to the entire community. She hopes to see parents connecting with their children through the museum experience and gaining knowledge about child development. When families grow stronger, communities grow stronger.

Children's Museum

Children at Play

There is something magical about children at play. Adults often reminisce about childhoods spent roaming the neighborhood, playing with other children, not an adult in sight, told to come back when it got dark. Some communities even sounded a horn to tell the kids it was time to head home.

When Jacob Wetterling was abducted, reality changed for generations of children in central Minnesota. Adults no longer feel safe letting kids venture distances unsupervised. Children’s free time is now filled with scheduled “play dates” and structured activities. Parents are busier working to pay for kids’ activities, planning, driving and juggling schedules.

Government initiatives like No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top have put the spotlight on schools’ test scores. Learning has become less about developing a natural curiosity and drive to discover and more about benchmarks and test taking skills. Experienced educators know that it’s skills like resiliency, emotional intelligence and self-control that determine success in life and these are skills best learned through the free play that is getting pressed out of school days and busy lives.

Play is a basic need of young children and adults alike. It is the way human brains are wired to learn. It is crucial for stress relief and mental health. One of modern society’s greatest challenges has become finding ways to get back to our roots of play. Play includes those creative experiences that happen when we carve out the space and time for free exploration, trial and error, and creating with others.

The Great River Children’s Exploratorium will be a place where parents can sit back, relax and delight in their children’s play. A place they can be confident that their children are safe to explore and learn. A safe haven, away from the noise of daily life, where adult caregivers can play and rediscover their inner child. While geared toward children from birth to ten, it will meet a need deep inside all of us.

Children's Museum

What’s a Children’s Museum

A children’s museum is a place where kids can be kids. It’s a safe place to explore their world. The name “Exploratorium” reflects this purpose. Rather than a museum where we carefully preserve the old, children’s museums allow kids to:

Play as grown ups in environments just their size.
Create with a variety of materials from giant blue blocks to paint and clay.
Experiment with water or electricity.
Use their imaginations in limitless ways.

You can experience how many other Minnesota cities have accomplished this in St. Paul, Duluth, Rochester, Mankato, Hutchinson and Grand Rapids. We look forward to adding St. Cloud to this list!

Fund Development

$25,000 Matching Gift

The Great River Children’s Exploratorium has a $25,000 matching pledge to add to our development fund! The first $25,000 in donations will be matched dollar for dollar by an anonymous donor. This is a wonderful way to double the impact of your gift. Send your tax deductible donation now via PayPal or mail a check to our treasurer at:

Great River Children’s Exploratorium
℅ Greg Reigstad
1126 7th Avenue North
Saint Cloud, MN 56303

About, Board Member Profile

Something New! for Glen Palm and the St. Cloud Area

We are doing something new in central Minnesota! Opening a children’s museum is a large and complicated feat. It was begun several years ago with the dream of Glen Palm.

Glen retired in 2013 from his position as chair of the Child and Family Studies department at St. Cloud State University where he spent his career teaching parenting education, supervising students, and writing about parent education and fatherhood. He is a longtime early childhood advocate in the St. Cloud Area. He originally founded Super Saturdays for dads and young children in District 742, a program that continues today. If you hear Glen joke that he “just got out of prison,” it is because of his important work with incarcerated fathers at the Minnesota Correctional Facility in St. Cloud.

Through a children’s museum, Glen sees a chance to fill a need in the community for a safe place for children and families to practice 21st century skills such as creativity, problem solving, teamwork and resilience in a playful atmosphere. He also sees it as a community project that will unify people from diverse backgrounds throughout the St. Cloud area. Upon his retirement from SCSU, he set about tackling early tasks such as gathering a small team of dedicated volunteers, establishing a non-profit organization, orchestrating community studies, and outlining a business plan. The location search has taken some time, but now appears to be nearing completion.

With the finalization of a location will come a host of new challenges to be tackled. Glen and his growing team will approach each obstacle with the playful, creative spirit born in each of us in early childhood. The prospect of getting the whole community involved in creating a safe place for children to be children is exciting and energizing.

Children's Museum

Welcome!

Welcome to the Great River Children’s Exploratorium blog! We will share news and updates about the progress of the museum, profile an important person involved in the project, and give you some background about the value of children’s museums. Thank you for checking us out.