Children's Museum of Pooler — Local services in Pooler

We have visited this museum a couple of times in the last year and always had a good experience, so we visited again this past Friday. I actually considered buying a membership, but was glad I opted for just a day pass after our most recent experience. I was shocked at the poor behavior of many of the children and their lack of parental supervision. I saw kids throwing sand, grabbing toys out of another kid’s hand, dumping toys on the floor and walking away, etc. One kid (looked to be about 10 years old) hogged the cash register in the grocery station the entire time we were there (about an hour and a half). When he finally stepped away from the grocery station toward the end of our visit, my son (age 4) stepped in to have a turn with the cash register. The child almost immediately ran in, threw on an apron, and told my child that HE was the shop keeper, not my child. I kindly informed him that my son was having a turn playing shop keeper and he looked at me as though I had slapped him. He had clearly never been told no. It’s irritating having to parent someone else’s child while whoever is responsible for them is off somewhere else being oblivious. My child was over in the farm station and picked up a stuffed animal sheep to play with it. A little girl at least his age or older grabbed it out of his hand and screamed at him and said the sheep was taking a nap and she proceeded to try and stop him from playing with anything else in that area. Once again, no parent around. It was difficult to play with the bin of dinosaur bones because others had dumped a bunch on the floor and walked away. My child was playing with the air tube where you stick a ball through the little door on the side and another child ran over while my child still had his hand in it and crammed his hand in, get them both stuck. Again, no parent. My child isn’t perfect of course, but I was there to correct him when needed. The staff were very friendly, but perhaps they should limit the number of children allowed in at one time. If possible, I recommend visiting when school is back in session. That’s when we visited in the past and had a much...

Really loved this place! It’s a comfortable escape from the hot summer heat. Really fun imaginative spaces. Love the play areas and craft areas. Science / learning areas. It really is unique and you can tell a lot of effort is put into the design. I think it is unfortunate that they don’t have restrooms available considering this is a place for small children.. there should be a restroom that is more easy to access.

It is a little unfortunate that there are so many signs reminding parents to clean up after there children. This is a hands on space where play is encouraged. Other children’s museums Have workers stationed at exhibits to tidy them up. I’m forced to pay for a ticket even though the exhibits are not for my use as an adult, being forced to clean is kind of strange for a paying customer. I come here as a way to get away from the chaos of messes at home. So my visit was kind of stressful. My 18 month old would want to run off to another area and it’s kind of hard to clean up toys without losing sight of her. At one point I was bent over picking up a birthday cake toy that had like 20 pieces and she ran off and i couldn’t find her for a few seconds.. that was really scary and as someone who paid for a ticket i should be able to enjoy my experience and not put in a situation where I’m having to choose between cleaning up toys and making sure my child is safe. I was there alone so there wasn’t anyone else to help me. The signs to clean up were posted everywhere so unfortunately it was so stressful I caused me so much anxiety I just decided to leave after 30 minutes.

I get it why it would be nice but I would really appreciate if you take a greater look at the customer experience and the stress those...

Pictures and descriptions from their website are pretty misleading. This isn’t really a “children’s museum,” more like a giant, loud, messy playroom in the middle of the outlet mall.

They advertise the “exhibits” as being great for ages 0-10, but it was very overwhelming for my 2 year old and I don’t know a single 9 or 10 year old who would’ve enjoyed playing with random dirty toys in a giant room full of screaming kids. They also don’t have a lot of the “exhibits” that are advertised on their website. They don’t even have bathrooms, you have to go out into the outlet mall for that.

Definitely don’t go on a Saturday afternoon; none of the rules are enforced and they’ll let in anyone who wants to come in. My poor kiddo had to deal with being nearly trampled several times and had toys snatched from him by older kids whose parents couldn’t care less about watching or correcting them. They don’t do reservations and don’t have any rules about how many people they allow in the building, so it gets extremely busy and hectic. We had to pick up my son and carry him to different areas so he wouldn’t be knocked over or stepped on.

It might have been a little more enjoyable if we had gone in the middle of a weekday, but regardless, we were hoping for a children’s museum and got something overpriced that barely qualifies as such. It was really not worth the $12 per person and the hour drive from Beaufort, and absolutely not worth a $185 annual membership. You can honestly get the same level of stress and disappointment from a McDonalds Play Place for free; in fact, they have one in the corner...