For Kids
The refurbished Bank of America Garden for Children was reopened and dedicated to former TCP Executive Director, Alice C. Herman on February 11, 2005. Come and check out all of the new features in the garden, including the Upside-down Crawly Thing, the Tarantula Table and the Saguaro Fountain. Stories for Children is held in the garden every Tuesday at 10:00 am.
To make your visit more meaningful, before you visit, try these special activity sheets and our large booklet (great for a rainy day at home)! Note: activity sheets are in Adobe Acrobat PDF format (portable document format) and some are designed for legal-sized paper (8-1/2 x 14"). [To access these forms you need the free downloadable software, Adobe Acrobat Reader.
TCP Museum Shops: Your Resource for Educational Desert Items
La Fuente and La Galería Museum Shops have special sections devoted just to kids. Great books, cool bug and reptile replicas, collection kits, puzzles, stuffed desert critters, rocks, t-shirts and more. And there's no sales tax! So help support the Park and your thirst for knowledge. Our books include board books for infants (Hide & Snake; I Howl, I Growl), coloring/learning books (Flying Colors, ), wonderful picture books (Don't Call Me Pig!; Lizards for Lunch; Clarence Goes Out West and Meets a Purple Horse, Look Who Lives in the Desert to name just a few!)
Specialty Tours Kids Love! (included in the price of admission. Parents remain with their children during all tours.) Meet at the Overlook.
- Stories in the Garden for Children - Tuesdays at 10:00 am. Join our inspired docents as they spin tales of the desert gauged to the audience. This "tour" often moves around the Park, enjoying plants, critters and art exhibits too.
- Family Ed-Ventures - 2nd Sunday of the month. 2:00 pm during the High Season (October through April) and 10:00 pm from May through September. This walking tour of the Park explores its features from a child's point of view.
- Reptile Ramble - Fridays at 10:00 am, April through October (when the reptiles aren't hybernating, of course). Come learn to identify resident reptiles of the Sonoran Desert: snakes, lizards, turtles and tortoises and their unique habits. We'll bring a few "domesticated" ones for brave souls to touch or study closely. Then tour the Park and spot the signs, spy a few. Then check out La Galería Museum Shop reptile section featuring books, shirts, and rubber reptiles.
- Letterboxing - Anytime. This is a self-guided ed-venture! Use our clue poem to navigate our trails in search of the hidden letterbox! Learn more about letterboxing here.
Special Events at Tohono Chul Park Kids Love!
- Park After Dark - Held each fall, this FREE Family open house highlights the desert after dark with art exhibits, hands-on activites and musical or theatrical entertainments.
- Night-blooming Cereus - Mother Nature chooses the special night (anytime mid-May through mid-August) when a significant number of these stunning desert plants will bloom. Tohono Chul Park has the world's largest known collection of Peniocereus greggii. Again the Park opens its doors for FREE after 6:00 pm (but it's best to see and smell the plants after dark), To find out the exact night, get on the Park's email reminder list by emailing membership@tohonochulpark.org. (Usually the plants only give us a day's advance "notice.") The Legend of the Night-bloooming Cereus (transcribed by Harold Bell Wright) of the Tohono O'odham tribe is read aloud too.
- Holiday Nights - Stroll amidst 500,000 twinkling lights and 400 luminaria, munching on home-baked cookies from our volunteers or goodies from Trader Joe's, savor the sounds of holiday music from some of your favorite local performers.
This bobcats kitten was born in Tohono Chul Park in 2002. These critters frequent our fountains! They even sharpen their claws on the new Sin Agua garden ramada (watto in Tohono O'odham). Photo by April Bourie
Desert Pathfinders Activity Booklet for children © TCP. Designed for kids to learn about the desert. Download it today
Tom McDonald, docent coordinator, and "Pyro" the mountain king snake (Lampropeltis pyromelana) staring right at you.
Jean Ekman Adams books about Clarence, the purple horse, grace the shelves of La Galería Museum shop at Tohono Chul Park. Usage © & granted by Jean Ekman Adams.
Rebecca Mecham checking out a desert book while Ambry Huff retells the story told in the Garden on the felt board created by Park docent Sonie Buck.
Flying Colors-Beautiful birds of the Southwest coloring/Learning Book written by conrad Storad and illustrated by Donna S. Atwood is a reference book and a colroing book for kids of all ages. © & permission to use cover granted by the publisher