An entire city can be built within Long Island Children's Museum. All it takes is a little imagination, and a basic understanding of architectural principles like balance and proportion. Luckily, the "Best of Long Island"-winning museum's Bricks & Sticks and Building Boom with KEVA exhibits teach those very concepts. Museum educators and interactive software provide inspiration as kids (and adults) design and shape skyscrapers, castles, bridges, and more out of blocks.

Those building activities are just two of the 14 hands-on exhibits that take families across the museum's grounds. The TotSpot area lets the youngest visitors slide and play on age-appropriate equipment, while other galleries let kids explore outdoor gardens, step inside giant bubbles, and film mock-newscasts, complete with hard-hitting exposés on just who is the real John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt. Even the onsite theater has an interactive element. Here, actors and musicians often invite kids on stage to join in on the performance.