inclusive events Archives

Loud noises, flashing lights and children running around, often away from their parents. This is what you find at many large-scale venues and indoor play centers. Even movie theaters. It’s not a recipe for success for a parent who has a child with sensory issues.

Many of our children’s museums in the Los Angeles area realize this and offer dedicated sensory-friendly times so that families in our community can enjoy them on their own terms. Without the noise, without the crowds and without the chaos.

Discovery Cube Los Angeles, just off the 210 freeway in Sylmar, has rolled out its Sensory Friendly Sundays, which take place on the third Sunday of every month from 8 to 10 a.m., and you’re going to like what you find when you visit.

After you park in the large (free) lot across the street, walk in to find early admission dedicated to guests and members with sensory sensitivities, and onsite tools including:

Noise-reducing headphones
A sensory friendly map
Visual cue cards
Increased staffing
Background music turned off
Quiet spaces available

Discovery Cube even provides sensory backpacks, while supplies last.

If there was ever a place that all families should enjoy, it’s Discovery Cube. With its locations in Los Angeles and Orange County, each is a feast for a child’s senses. At the Los Angeles location you’ll find a multitude of exhibits, each allowing kids to touch, feel and engage. There are three featured exhibits: DC Super Heroes, The Race to Zero Waste and The Coaches Corner that was produced with an assist from the L.A. Kings – plus the Physics lab: The Raceway, where guests will learn about friction, drag, energy, speed and acceleration.

Want more? There’s Cube Studios, which is an interactive broadcast booth where kids tell stories about the environment and climate change from their perspective. There’s Eco Challenge: Planetary Research Station to explore space science, and there are three different Earth & Environment exhibits that allow kids to touch an aquifer, a helicopter and even a market as they learn about healthy and eco-friendly shopping choices.

Add a climbing wall to all of that, and even two on-site cafés, and you have more than enough reasons to visit.

The team at Discovery Cube inspires and educates young minds through engaging science-based programs and exhibits to create a meaningful impact on the communities it serves. The Los Angeles location is open daily, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and here are the Sensory-Friendly Sundays that have early hours from 8 to 10 a.m. dedicated to you:

January 19
February 16
March 16
April 20
May 18
June 15
July 20

Discovery Cube Los Angeles is located at 11800 Foothill Blvd., Sylmar, 91342.

Our L.A. Parent team: Meaghan, Chelsea, Ron, Nina, Cindy, Cassandra and Elena.

When L.A. Parent launched our Inclusive L.A. newsletter in 2013, it connected us to families like yours – and to some wonderful brands in our community that have programs for our children who learn differently, have sensory issues or other challenges. We uncovered educational programs and summer camps, social-skill building programs, theater classes and more – all for your kids and all taught by caring instructors, many of whom have children of their own who are on the autism spectrum.

The more programs we featured, the wider our community grew. Moms and dads continue to tell us that they turn to L.A. Parent – through this newsletter, our website, our socials and our magazine – and that is beyond gratifying for our team because each one of us is a parent, too.

Today, the newsletter that you are reading has won several national awards for its content, and that’s a source of immense pride for us. And if you find the info here helpful, you’ll find even more on LAParent.com: more events for our neurodiverse friends, more parenting tips and more resources near you that will help.

We’ll keep sharing what we uncover, be it a singing program like The Miracle Project, a ballet program like Ballet for All Kids, a computer animation studio and non-profit digital arts school such as Exceptional Minds or job placement programs – and there are a few of those for adults with Autism. And we hope you’ll stay connected with us because we’re part of your community.

If you have family or friends who may enjoy keeping up on the people, products and programs we write about in the inclusive community, have them sign up for this newsletter. We send it out on the first Wednesday of each month, and it’s an easy read. It’s also free. The more people we help, the better we’re doing our job. You can sign up using this link – just type Inclusive in the Message field – or you can send me a note with the your name and email and I’ll take care of it. My email is ron.epstein@laparent.com.

On behalf of the parents who make up the L.A. Parent team – Elena, Cassandra, Nina, Cindy, Chelsea and Meaghan – we wish you and your family and wonderful holiday season and a happy and healthy new year.

Ron Epstein

Publisher