CDC Museum

Recently I watched a television show called Mysteries of the Museum, which highlights unusual artifacts in various museums throughout the country (I happen to be a museum junkie).  The show highlighted something in the CDC Museum in Atlanta, which I did not even know existed!  Upon researching it, I learned that the museum is free and had a current exhibit on cells, which we were about to study!  So, we made a trip.

The first exciting aspect of this field trip is the security.  It is like going into the airport.  When we drove up, the security officers made me get out of the car, open all the doors, and pop the hood.  Sadly, I had no idea how to pop the hood on my mini-van.  I didn't want to think I was driving a car that was not mine, so I had to act cavalier until I figured it out.  They let the girls stay in their car seats as they searched my entire car, including under the car.

Then, we parked.  When we entered the building, I had to show my picture ID and complete some forms for each of us.  We were all issued security badges to wear on our shirts.  It's a good thing that children do not need picture IDs, because my kids don't have them.

The first floor exhibit we saw was about cells.  Catherine completed this "puzzle" about different shaped cells doing different jobs in the body:

The best part of the cell exhibit was the huge strand of DNA.  Catherine played a video game of matching base pairs to create a DNA stand:

Sabrina stood in front of a video of some of the cells in her body.

This is a shot of the bottom floor of the museum, which covered the history of the CDC and various public health crises. 

Sabrina looked through a magnifying glass of fetal pigs in various stages of development, to compare them to fetal humans.

My Dad came with us to the museum.  He and Catherine tried to figure out where each organ goes in this mannequin:

 It was a lot harder than they thought it would be:

 Catherine standing next to a display on how to mail biomedical hazardous items:

 Here is a display on the availability of clean water in developing countries:

 An exhibit on controlling mosquitoes:

 Posters encouraging people to be vaccinated against small pox:

 A portable small pox vaccine kit:

 Sabrina looking at an iron lung:

 Sabrina trying on the adult-sized haz-mat suit:

One section of the museum contained a wall of magnetic words.  It encouraged people to make questions, like a scientist does:

This was a great museum, which my kids loved!