Muncie Children's Museum

Just barely three stars, and only three stars because my children seemed to enjoy our visit. Like someone else said, this children's museum has seen better days, and those days were probably about 20 years ago. Everything is very old, dingy and dated. There are literally computer printouts taped to the walls as decorations. Many of the exhibits have broken and dirty objects in them, like torn upholstery on the chairs, dirty play food, torn carpet. Now, there is some art that is laminated, but those are peeling off the walls and placed on the wall all crooked. All these things make the museum feel so neglected. We got there on a weekday right when it opened, and the staff was still vacuuming while the children were running around and playing. Really? You can't do this before you open? Children were running around and jumping over the vacuum cord. Then, when I went to the gift shop to buy some food, the same dumb vacuum was placed right in front of the door so that I had to walk around it. Each of these things are not very big, but it's little things like this that show lack of attention to detail and bad customer service. The restroom is extremely old, and the handicap stall that I visited did not have a working lock. The toilet seat was literally disintegrating. The whole museum is not very well ventilated, and I kept smelling kid farts everywhere I went. (FYI: Kids fart a lot.) This museum is two stories, but when we visited, the exhibits upstairs were blocked off and no one could use them. Our visit was contained to the downstairs portion. I came with low expectations, but this was ridiculous and disappointing. Well, disappointing to me. My kids had fun, which is the whole point of visiting a children's museum, right? Nevertheless, I most likely won't be back unless the children beg me, which probably won't happen because there are many other places to play that are not in a state of disrepair.

We came for a relaxing visit with our grand daughter and enjoyed our time. The building is tucked in with other buildings so it's a bit confusing to find. I'm not sure how long it has been in service but all exhibits were in good repair. The team here was very friendly and helpful.The exhibits are all hands on. Lots of emphasis on play and trying things to learn. Not much instruction on how to do things. Definitely no TVs or other electronics to take you away from doing hands on/body engaging things. We really liked the giant slide. The small turtle exhibits were interesting as well for a 3 year old. Playing house and kitchen and food was also appealing. A piano that you bang the keys on is always interesting as well.Give this place a try if you are in Muncie and looking for something different to do.

I really wanted to love this museum. There is great space and infrastructure, but it just fails in the details. Volunteers and a few hundred dollars could change this museum from meh to really fun and educational. For example, there is a pretend veterinarian office that I was excited for as we climbed the steps. What was in this well built cozy space? There were a few stuffed animals, a couple posters and a few laminated cards with X-ray photos. It was like someone had this awesome idea, built a great structure for it and then walked away. So disappointing. How do you make this existing area a place for kids to want to play and learn? Add a scale to weigh the animals, a couple stethoscopes, toy syringes for shots, a couple lab coats, a few bandages to wrap up broken animal bones and a microscope with animals related slides. The hard and expensive work has already been done, it just needs to be finished. This is just one example of what needs to happen in nearly every area of the museum. The under 5 year old area had some really nicely built areas including a tree house, boat, market, etc. Such fun ideas and the structures were in good shape. However, it's the details that made it fall flat. There were just a handful of duplo blocks for building - not enough for more than one kid, puzzles that were missing pieces, toy mailboxes with nothing to put in them, etc. Elsewhere in the museum these examples continue. There is a nice stage area for kids to put on a show but there are no costumes or props. Magnetic fishing seems really fun but the magnets are just frustrating and too hard for kids to handle. The piano has signage that says to look for the "blue" keys yet none of the keys are blue. There was a really nice outdoor space that was just wasted. There was a neat tree house to climb but nothing to do other than spin one steering wheel at the top. Nice tables provided a place to sit but there wasn't anything outside that captured a child's attention long enough to warrant sitting. Maybe the area is used for special events or summer camps?My nearly 3 year old and I spent 2 hours at the museum which was enough time for him to do everything he was wanted and revisit favorite areas. Again, I really wanted to love this little museum. Some TLC, elbow grease and a few hundred dollars could make a huge impact.

We came here last year before my granddaughter could walk, and things were rather dirty and worn out but we tried to have a good time. Here it is a year later and I decided to take my granddaughter back now that she can walk. We had a busload of kids right before us and they were just leaving when we got there. The entire place was in disarray and so many things are worn out, dirty, broken, and the employees were just sitting in the office. Not trying to pick up after the chaos of the school bus. My granddaughter didn't know the difference and still had a good time, but I feel like we both need to go take a bath now. Someone should have at least been walking around with a cleaning bottle cleaning up the toys because clearly people are going to put stuff in their mouth. Even the little cracker boxes and the Pop-Tart boxes in the kitchen are all torn apart. How hard would it be to get a new empty Pop-Tart box? Or empty cracker box. Maybe it's a question of funding and it doesn't have much to go on? But things need to be spruced up, painted, and thoroughly cleaned.

Well I haven't been to the Muncie Childern's Museum since well I was a kid myself back in the early 80's so I rember the old place and have been spoiled living in Indianapolis with our Children's museum. But all in all the new location is pretty nice. I liked the outdoor space a lot it was imaginative, and leveraged local themes in its design. The play area was not open though as the turtles were breeding in that area.Inside my two kids 5 and 10 both found plenty to entertain and learn about for around 2 1/2 hours. They both had a great time. Sometimes it is funny but my daughter couldn't get enough of the seemingly simple Ant Crawl area right up front. While my son loved seeing the full size big rig that is in back. They even have a whole tiny village with stores, a school, a doctors office to play in. They have a pretty nice play area inside to climb on and a decent sized slide that both my kids enjoyed. And a neat feature that we all liked was the huge and very elaborate model railroad that is built inside. In the back there is a special area for kids under 5 to play and my daughter was still young enough to play here but it will definitely appeal to those with the young toddlers.There is a small water play table that is nice, not as elaborate as the Indy museum but similar in a smaller scale. In the upper level there is a PBS kids lab but the stations that were working were all in use. The only complaint here is that some of the stations were out of order. Also the whole fire safety area was not open either I am not sure if they are redoing that area. Overall for the price which is a reasonable $6 per person. They also offer a free day which I happend to luckily be visiting on the 3rd Sunday of each month. However, it will be extremely busy but wasn't too bad.Also a unique feature is they have quite a few different animals/insects/reptiles/ and turtles on display to see.

In the two weeks since I wrote my initial review of Muncie Children's Museum, a 1-star review indicating my concerns about being refused admission and an overall, unwritten policy denying admission to adults without a child, I have been called a variety of names in written response with most coming in via other forms of social media - names such as "perv," "creep," "libtard," and a handful of others. In fact, I've even received one threat of physical harm. I guess those Muncie folks take their children's museum seriously, eh?The truth is that after two weeks of receiving mostly negative feedback and nary a comment at all from the actual organization, I was starting to wonder if it was all worth it. Then, yesterday I received a message from a former employee of the museum who actually responded respectfully and made some recommendations about how I could effectively address my concerns and whom I should actually contact to do so. She expressed her own concerns about an adult being in the museum, which I certainly understand, and she also seemed to doubt that I was actually "refused" admission (I was!). However, I really appreciated her respectful tone and I felt like she was listening. I followed up by e-mail with the contact she'd given me and by this afternoon had received a written response that addressed my concerns, explained their position, but also listened to one recommendation I had, in particular, that would honor their practices while addressing my concerns. I explained my reason for visiting and the situation I was in during my visit to Muncie that led to my attempt to check out the museum. Part of my reasoning was to, in essence, offer the possibility that there are legitimate reasons an adult may wish to visit. In the response I received, I learned that the museum accepted my recommendation that a statement be added to the website offering a process through which adults could visit with advance notice. The website offers a direct contact person and a clear, concise policy that takes away the guess work. Had this policy been on the website prior to my attempted visit, I certainly would have followed it as it's used by other children's museums. While I'd never had this experience in Indiana, I was aware of one other museum that had a similar concern/policy and I found it to be a reasonable, fair compromise. I was extremely impressed that the museum implemented it all quickly and, in fact, it had been added to their website even before I received a response. While I certainly will always speak up when an admission policy or other business practices seems unfair, I will also always respect the need of a business to protect those they serve. The door was left open that I would be able to visit in the future, with advanced notice, and I appreciated the tremendous clarity and commitment of the organization in communicating with me and in developing this solution.

The children's museum is a really cool place and the kid that my wife and I brought really loves this place. But I feel that this place needs a lot of TLC...everything seems really dusty, the floors are dirty. Half of the trains seem like they don't work and many other displays seem very worn down or broke. Don't get me wrong, I will come back, but I wish they would invest some time in cleaning and refreshing this place.

Have a 18month old that just loves this place. Great place for even older kids to play on the indoor play equipment. My son could live at the water table. Place is always clean, staff is always welcoming and bathrooms are always clean. We will be back many more times can't rate this place high enough on family fun.

The water table is awesome! And the pretend play areas. The staff was very friendly.

The museum was great. My children, ages 3 and 6 had a fantastic time and are eager to return. We were there for a few hours and they did not want to leave. Like many museums and attractions there are broken exhibits and items in need of repair, but with the price of admission, what is available for viewing and experiencing is more than sufficient. We completed the coloring activity listed on the webpage and the museum honored my children's request to receive their free sand-art, which they were able to make themselves! At the end of the day my children had a fantastic time and we look forward to visiting again. Thank you muncie children's museum!