December 26, 2018
Edison and Ford Winter Estates Celebrates National Kid Inventors’ Day
Media Contact:
Lisa Wilson, APR, Public Relations Director
239-334-7419
LWilson@EdisonFordWinterEstates.org
PHOTO: A family has fun inventing in the Smithsonian Spark!Lab at Edison and Ford Winter Estates.
Edison and Ford Winter Estates Celebrates National Kid Inventors’ Day
FORT MYERS, Fla. (December 26, 2018) — On January 17, children and their parents are invited to be an inventor in the Smithsonian Spark!Lab at Edison and Ford Winter Estates (EFWE) for National Kid Inventors’ Day. The event will run from 5:30-7:30 p.m. and offers free admission to the museum and Edison’s laboratory. 
Special interactive and hands-on activities will be available throughout the 15,000-square-foot inventions museum. Visitors will learn about how Edison, Ford and Firestone tested rubber; hear about the science of sound; animate a moving picture; observe a LEGO Robotics demonstration; learn about inventions kids have created; and test inventive skills in the Smithsonian Spark!Lab.
The Spark!Lab offers families and children six different invention stations. Groups and individuals alike can have fun inventing at each station. Activities include:
- -New this month is the Towering Teeter Table, a balancing challenge suited for all ages, where inventors build structures and learn to balance them.
- -High Wire Driver is an activity where visitors use a variety of building supplies and simple motors to invent devices that can roll along a cable, suspended above a table or work surface. This station allows participants to create imaginative high wire driving cameras, cable cars or even an overhead cash carrier.
- -At the Snap Circuits station, inventors will create and test electric circuits and devices such as LEDs, light bulbs, fan motors, flying disc launchers, and even a radio.
- -In Gearheads, another new activity, users make inventions with gears and then test them in real time.
- -The Vertical Wind Tunnel is a favorite among visitors and allows inventors to experiment with a wind tunnel, a playful and inventive way to explore the effects of moving air on objects.
- -In the activity Soundscapes, participants will use parts included in the activity to create music and sound pathways for marbles.
Kid Inventors’ Day celebrates children’s achievements and encourages creativity. The date, Benjamin Franklin’s birthday, honors the childhood inventor who invented swim flippers when he was just 12 years old. Other notable childhood inventions include the popsicle, trampoline, ear muffs and Braille.
Thomas Edison, another childhood inventor, created a lab in his parent’s basement when he was just 10 years old. He often took watches and other things apart to see how they worked. When he was 12, he started publishing a newspaper and sold the publication to train passengers.
The Smithsonian Spark!Lab encourages children of all ages to be creative and think like an inventor. EFWE is one of only nine museums in the country to have a Spark!Lab. For more information, visit our website or call 239-334-7419.
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