Pushing wheelbarrows at Scitech in Perth

I love it that you can take young kids to a science museum and they have no idea at all that all those colourful games are actually designed to teach them stuff – and they keep wanting to go back, over and over again.

This is certainly what is happening with my son and his ongoing love affair with the Scitech Discovery Centre, housed at the CityWest centre just outside of the Perth CBD.

A day at the Scitech Discovery Centre

My son’s nearly five now, but we’ve had regular visits to Scitech since he could walk – they hold an annual Toddlerfest with extra activities to suit the little ones and although it’s the most insane time of year to be there, he fell in love with it.

Our visits tend to follow a fairly predictable pattern. Near the entrance, a pretend construction site with ramps, wheelbarrows, rubber bricks, pulleys and baskets always entices him in: apparently, at age two, three and four (so far), there is nothing more exciting than filling wheelbarrows with soft bricks, taking them up the ramp (preferably the steeper ramp as there’s more possibility of a crash), building them up into a wall, then destroying it and starting all over again by sending the bricks back down below.

Then there are the crazy mirrors (he likes the one that makes him look fat; obviously, I don’t), the spinning wheels and a helicopter simulator, and a bunch of other regular exhibits that are usually there (though sometimes moved around just to be tricky). The incubator with hatching chicks is a must-stop as well.

By then, it’s time for us to explore the rotating exhibits. Last year there was a sideshow alley exhibit with clowns and tin cans to topple, all with the obligatory scientific explanation (at this age, interesting for parents, but not exactly gripping for a four-year-old – but of course, he’s learning by doing instead!). On our last visit there was a robot who could impersonate any number of Hollywood stars.

Now that my son has hit four, he’s also ready to see the Planetarium shows and he was pretty spell-bound by the planets and space travel film we watched there on our last trip. When I was a kid, the space that’s now the Planetarium was a popular 3D cinema, but now it’s another part of Scitech and included in the entry price, so we always include a stop there. As he gets older still, there are other exhibits and shows that will start to interest him more, even though he might start to realise they are actually teaching him something!

But these days, before we leave, it is fairly inevitable that my son will want to have another go at the wheelbarrows. If you want the ultimate home playground to occupy small boys, I highly recommend ramps, bricks and wheelbarrows – I wish I’d built one at home years ago! In the meantime, we just make our regular trips to Scitech and allow plenty of time for pushing bricks.

Amanda Kendle is a born and bred Perth girl who loves to hang around with her rubbish-truck-loving four-year-old son. Amanda has lived and worked abroad in Asia and Europe and has been blogging about her travels at home and abroad for almost a decade at Not A Ballerina.