Delilah Clark, 2, shows off the yellow-and-purple sauropod dinosaur she made Saturday during the Weekend Family Workshop at the Wrangell Museum. The museum has started offering the educational workshops as part of an educational outreach.
Wrangellites looking for child-friendly weekend activities now have one more option.
The Wrangell Museum has started offering Weekend Family Workshops focusing on aspects of Wrangell and Alaska history. The second workshop – focusing on dinosaurs found in Alaska - was held Saturday morning. The workshops are offered on the third Saturday of every month, and feature crafts based around the theme. A workshop held Dec. 21 focused on using locally available materials to construct Christmas ornaments, said museum director Megan Clark.
"I try to do a little lesson with them at the same time," she said. "We learned about how previously living on an island in recent history, they haven't been able to get all the Christmas supplies and what-not, so the children here made their ornaments."
February's workshop will focus on stars and astronomy.
Museum officials modeled the workshops after similar activities held at the Seattle Museum of Flight, said Clark. She used to work at the Museum of Flight's education program.
They also serve as an important step toward the years-long process of earning a vital accreditation for the museum with the American Association of Museums, Clark said.
"We're going to have to prove at least three years of a strong education program," she said. "This is one of the things we're adding to our education program."
The museum's educational outreach also includes the Chautauqua lecture series, set for February and March this year, Clark added.
The accreditation could allow the Wrangell Museum access to traveling exhibits and artifact loans, and may provide a step up in seeking grant funding, Clark said.
For the children who attended Saturday's workshop in the Nolan Center classroom, the event was all about the triceratops, though other dinosaurs and marine reptiles discovered in Southeast as recently as last summer also featured in a brief talk about dinosaurs. The event also included dinosaur-themed mobiles as a craft project, cookies and juice. Activities are focused around what younger elementary-school-age children would find enjoyable.
Attendance Saturday was low, though that might have been a function of the Seattle Seahawks playing in Sunday's NFC Championship Game at CenturyLink Field, which may have drawn many parents and children out of town to take in the game, Clark said.
The museum hopes to start including other forms of educational outreach beside the lectures and workshops, Clark said.
"I'm planning to start teaching some classes," she said.
A genealogy workshop is planned for this weekend at 10 a.m., Clark said.
The next Weekend Family Workshop is planned for Feb. 15.
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