with teamLab Future Park

Light balls and hopscotch – and so much more – will keep children entertained and learning at teamLab Future Park, a new exhibit at the Village at the Mall of Georgia.

The exhibit’s stations are designed to foster creativity, demonstrate cause and effect, and teach educational concepts without children realizing that they are learning through play. It certainly worked with our three boys, ages 10, 8 and 4 – we practically had to bribe them to leave after two hours.

The highly interactive digital exhibit is housed in a large, dark room with seven different colorful stations. The “Light Ball Orchestra” station featuring a sea of large balls illuminated in different colors. My boys enjoyed running from ball to ball with other children to generate different sounds based on color by bouncing, rolling or tapping each one.

“Create! Hopscotch for Geniuses” had sound effects and music and kids – and adults – hopped gleefully about.

The “Sketch Aquarium” and “Sketch Town” stations looked like giant screen savers – one wall was a digital ocean scene with vibrant sea creatures floating around, while the other featured a cityscape. We marveled at the creative process involved as our boys chose paper templates, colored them with special crayons, scanned them in and watched their images co–me alive on each of the huge screens. They even created 3-D versions of their sketches, as souvenirs to take home.

While the exhibit is designed for toddler to elementary school aged kids, we saw plenty of teens and adults joining in the fun. This exhibit is too good to miss!

Know Before You Go: Allow at least an hour to take in everything due to the highly interactive nature of each exhibit, and be sure to have a snack beforehand, since no food is allowed inside.

– Felicia Barman