DC Public Library (DCPL)
- All free with your library card, access more than 15 million free online movies, eBooks, music and more from the DC Public Library at https://www.dclibrary.org/godigital
- Join us on Facebook Monday - Friday at 10:30 a.m. for live video story times. Fun for the whole family to enjoy.
- Did you know that DC Public Library has an Instagram account dedicated to teens, curated by teens? Checkout @DCLibraryTeens for fun at-home activities and reading suggestions for teens to enjoy.
- Join us on Twitter, Monday-Friday, to participate in virtual book clubs. New topics are discussed each day and you can easily join the conversation by using the associated hashtags.
- Anyone with a DC Public Library card can stream videos through Access Video, including its collection of workouts. Clips range from five minutes to more than an hour in length, and include pilates for beginners, weights workouts, yoga flows, and boxing routines.
- The library’s catalog of audiobooks and ebooks is available through the Libby app. Download it to your phone or tablet, enter your library card information, and you can rent immediately. Note that like with physical items, there are only so many digital copies of things to go around, and wait lists can be lengthy for popular titles.
- The library also has a digital news rack with stacks of the latest (e) magazines ready for you to peruse like Bon Appétit, the New Yorker, and Popular Mechanics.
- You can now sign up for a library card online and receive unlimited access to digital resources for 90 days. Watch, read, listen and learn while maintaining your social distance. http://ow.ly/xRQb50yR0zo
The Kennedy Center
- Kennedy Center’s first-ever Education Artist-in-Residence Mo Willems is inviting viewers virtually into his illustration studio every day at 1 p.m. for a LUNCH DOODLE. This online video series will walk fellow artists through Willems’ process as he draws, illustrates, and doodles. So, grab some paper and crayons and do some doodling!
- The Kennedy Center archives many of its performances in its online catalog: There you can find video of a demonstration and lesson from the dancers of this year’s Sleeping Beauty ballet, Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ acceptance speech from the 2018 Mark Twain Comedy Prize ceremony, selections from Lupe Fiasco’s Kennedy Center debut in November, and more.
Milk Street Online Cooking Classes
At the Milk Street Online Cooking School you won’t learn just recipes, you'll learn new ways to approach food and cooking, giving you a reinvigorated enthusiasm for putting dinner on the table. All online classes are free! Click here to start cooking
Other Activity Ideas
- 30 Parents Share Their Favorite At-Home Activities to Help Bored Kits
- NASA offers STEM activities for kids stuck at home
- Keeping Your Kids Entertained At Home While Social Distancing
- The Secret to Keeping Your Kids Happy, Busy and Learning if Their School Closes Due to Coronavirus
- 23 fun activities to do with kids using stuff you already have at home, as you wait out coronavirus closures
- 3-Ingredient Pantry Dinners for When You Can't Get to the Grocery Store
- Empower DC has a list of education and activity ideas to do at home and links to a variety of other resources
- Alvin Ailey dance performances online
- Free online concerts
- Online Kid Activities for Families Stuck at Home
- Busy Toddler Indoor Activity Ideas
- 100 Activities to do at Home During School Closures
Smithsonian
- The Smithsonian National Gallery of Art is hosting daily tours, one gallery at a time on Twitter and, providing videos and photos of galleries on its website.
- The Smithsonian released nearly 3 million images of their collections into the public domain and available for anybody to download, transform, and share without permission. This means you can create your very own meme or work of art using the 3D digitization of the Apollo 11’s Columbia crew hatch, any one of the 17 collection items related to baseball great Jackie Robinson, or an image of Susan B. Anthony’s inkstand.
- Watch a live feed of the four new baby cheetah cubs at the National Zoo here.