Ann Arbor Hands-On Museum

Fantastic place for kids of all ages! Even «the kid at heart» adult! I especially love that kids are learning through play! My little ones loved playing in the toddler area with the balls & water stations. A plus that you can pretty much find a bathroom on any level with changing tables too. Also have nursing rooms available. Great times & can’t wait to put our membership to use!

This is one of my son’s favorite places to go. There is something for everyone and I love that they have a separate area for the preschoolers that isn’t closet sized (it’s a mezzanine level). In the preschool area, there is an infant area that is closed in as well as a water area (so bring extra clothes). It’s closely monitored, always staffed, and there is a ton for the kids to do. However, if you plan on going on a weekend, a holiday, or during the summer, just be prepared for it to be packed. Outside of the preschool area, there is a ton for the older kids too (and the older preschool kids). My son is 3 and we do the entire museum. He loves it all.
A couple of important things:
The pricing people have posted in their reviews in the past is wrong — it’s $ 12 a person over 23 months old. If you’re going to go more than once or take more than 5 people, you might as well just purchase a membership for $ 75 and get a year out of it.
You will have to walk a few blocks to get to the museum from the parking garage down the street (~$ 4). I walk my three year old without a stroller with no problem.
There are lockers available for $ 0.50 and a coat rack. I can fit my huge purse and both of our coats in a locker with room to spare. I would NOT recommend bringing a stroller here. There is one small elevator (as in maybe two strollers can fit in it at the same time — and it’d be a tight fit), four floors, and if it’s busy, you can forget about getting between the levels in a timely manner. When it’s busy, dragging a stroller up the stairs (without your kid in it obviously) isn’t going to happen either. If you can, I’d bring a carrier if you have a little one.
We bring our own lunch (despite the «no food or drink» sign). There is an area to sit and eat on the first floor. There is nowhere to purchase food outside of vending machines.

Very good. Lots of education kid activities here. Probably one of the better facilities in this class in Michigan. They have a segregated room with super stuff for toddlers. The exhibits are in pretty good shape with a progression of material of interest to all ages. It appears to be a well-​run facility. Parking nearby can be difficult. The regular price is a bit high for what it is, though I suppose most who go frequently are members.

This place is amazing. Now that it is too cold to go outside I take my son here 3 – 4 times per week. It is big, there are tons of things to do, the people are nice. Membership is reasonably priced. My son is two years old and he LOV ES the toddler room. There are activities for lots of different age groups.

If I lived in Ann Arbor, I would take my kid here, however I kept feeling like it wasn’t quite worth the drive from Detroit. I had high expectations because so many people had told me about this place. The tiny fourth floor is really cool — so don’t miss that. The thing that bothered me the most was that they didn’t have water proof smocks in their large water play area. I asked and they said something about not being able to find «one size fits all» water smocks. I guess they meant for bigger kids since the small water area in the preschool room does have water smocks. The Chicago Children’s Museum, the Detroit Science Center, and countless other children’s museums manage to find water proof smocks that accommodate the kids who need them. AAHoM should get some that fit the 5 – 7 year olds that want to play with water but are too old for the preschool area.

Seems to be your typical children’s museum. It has 250 all hands on activities for kids. We got tickets to go for free. So that is a major plus. Price for 4 people 2 adults and 2 kids is 60 bucks. Glad mine were free. I don’t see it being worth that price. It is neat and has some cool activities though. For the price it does seem abit lacking. We drove a hour from Detroit to come here. I will bring the family again if I get free tickets. But other than that we won’t be back. My daughter loves the water room and the building blocks. Rest is not grabbing her attention.

Great for kids, lots to do. Being in Ann Arbor you must park and walk to get there. You have little kids and you have to walk several blocks in the cold, rain or both. There is no parking at the museum. Second issue is food. At the entrance it has a sign NO FOOD or BEVERAGES. They do have vending machines. All junk food. They have exhibits talking about healthy eating yet serve nothing but junk food. They also have exhibits telling everyone to recycle yet they have no recycling bins got the plastic drink bottles. I am no tree hugger but the exhibits to you one thing and they do another. It’s the old adage do as I say not as I do… as a whole it’s great for your youngster.
Parents control your kids kids throwing things or running knocking over little ones and parent just ignores them.

After having a chance to go to other places very similar to this I don’t see how the Ann Arbor hands on museum would deserve 5 stars as it is just mediocre. I have seen places so much better, cleaner, bigger, innovative and more to do over all as well. This place could really use a huge update or possibly locate to an even larger space would be worth while. I do think it is nice that they have a room for preschool age and under so they dont need to worry about being trampled by big kids, the bigger kids have the rest of the museum.
Check out Imagination station in Toledo or the Children’s Museum in Chicago, they are worth visiting.

5 stars because the kids loved it and had a blast!!! 1 star for me & the other nannies that came along, because we were bored out of our minds. Probably won’t do it again, but the area was nice considering we were able to walk to a nearby restaurant.

Ahh my son loved this place!!! So far the best kids museum in mi!
Tons of science exhibits and fun exhibits for the kiddos. He was 2 the first time he went there so he didn’t understand some of theore advanced exhibits though now he loves it great for all ages.

Very nice place for kids to learn from the displays but the entrance price is so bloody high that the kids who need it the most can’t even think of going there. The place needs to be supported bylocal business, and school system, and the city, and NOT by entrance fees.

This place is so fun! When I worked with a child care program, we took a few field trips here and I had just as much fun if not more than the kids lol. So many cool things to see and try. So glad this place exists!

Absolutely fantastic place for kids. Lots of fun things to play with and touch. It is very well kept up. Everything worked as it should despite being played with hundreds of times per day by little kids. It is a very well run, high quality place to take your little ones.

My fiancée’s daughter loved this place and we did as well. Parking can be difficult but we grabbed a spot on the street that was closer than the parking garage. We went on Saturday but it still wasn’t super busy. Would definitely visit again!

The Niecelets Got Their HANDS ON…
…A Stair Banister
…A Mini Slide
…A Tambourine
…A Plastic Bucket
…A Bunch of Colorful Balls
…A Cool Contraption
…A Pair of Yellow Smocks
…A Couple of Green Stepstools
…A Water Spigot
…A Bunch of Rubber Duckies
…A Pile of Legos
…A Stack of Pink Blocks
…A Motherly Bond and
HELD HANDS with their Doting Aunties.

We visited yesterday and weren’t that impressed. Lets start at the entry. The customer service wasn’t very friendly. They didn’t offer us a map even though they knew we were first time visitors (maybe because we were using free reciprocal entry?).
Our kids are 11 & 8. We homeschool, so we have a lot of museum experience. I looked ahead of time and my son (8) who loved to figure out gears and how things operate was sUper excited to check out the ball machine room. Upon entry (to the only area he was interested in going) we were denied the ability to explore the room. I GET protecting toddlers, but REALLY to the exclusion of the kids who can actually understand the workings of the room? Maybe fence off a smaller area for younger kids to play safely? Or maybe have expanded age ranges during certain hours for the older kids to have fun in that area too?
It makes families with school aged kids much less interested in going back to your museum. If your purpose is to only have a museum for toddlers keep doing what your doing. If you want your clientele to be returning year after year consider expanding your exhibits to a wider age range.

Took my little cousin here for an afternoon of fun and had a great time myself. I was a kid who was super into educational fun and science so as a wee one I would have loved a place like this. I still had a blast as an adult though, too!
Water toys, weather, a look at how a house is built, fun with bubbles, crazy cool light and optics fun, magnets, physics lessons (like pulleys, levers, etc), engines, architecture and engineering, the human body, an old timey general store and more. Plenty to see and something for all kiddie interests. There’s even a preschool floor for the young-youngin’s.
Like a few folks have already stated this place is a bit on the smaller side. Like we were finished in a couple of hours but it’s good if you have a few places you want to go or just want to kill some time for an afternoon like we did. You don’t have to commit a lot of time to a visit. $ 11 for a visit and late hours on Thursdays (till 8pm) but they do offer memberships if you like to visit more often.

This place rocks my world! It is definitely worth the drive over to Ann Arbor for us. My 2.5 year old has a great time every time we go. We especially love the Preschool Gallery with the pretend play fire truck and the amazing ball rollercoaster type thing. It is super interactive and hands on, but there are also quiet corners to work on a puzzle or explore with magnets.
We love the AAHoM! Of course, I would love it even more if it was a little bit closer to home — we’d be here every week! We are members at Cranbrook Science, so we get a discount on our visits here. Awesome place — we are lucky to have it!

Review update: Back at the hands on museum on a field trip day. The staff that was there was super pleasant but I see what other reviewers mean by «understaffed».
School grade kids stayed out of the toddler area for the most part but a few trickled in and got obnoxious with the play balls.
I think the time they needed more staff the most was when the kids got ready to go. The chaperones had all the kids meet (and block) in the main entrance/​exit. This also happened to be the time I needed to go and change a rather bad diaper. Seeing that there are signs posted that your not allowed to change diapers in the toddler room, we had to wait for a whole before going to the blocked bathroom. It was just a long time to block the only way in and out of the museum.
I think that an increased staff on days they are expecting field trips or camps would really help everyone.

Since I am not a art or history fanatic the hands on museum is perfect for kids and the kid at heart (me)
It is no COSI and won’t tke more than 2 hours to go through but the $ 5 after 5pm deal on thursdays is perfect, otherwise the entrance is $ 10 pp above the age of 2 which is steep for the fact that it is not that big.
It has 4 floors but the top 3 are very small, still fun.
Our favorite was the video dancing on the top floor but there was a ton of fun things to do and a nice break from movies, video games and all the other garb that kids are into nowadays.
I wouldn’t drive more than an hour to get here, but being on vacation in Ann Arbour this was perfect and my son (8) had a great time.