KidZania helps children 4-14 learn important skills that will be useful to them in adult society while having fun at the same time through role-playing in an authentic real-world environment.
Kids four to 14 now have a dedicated playground to spend their tremendous energies, develop their talents and capabilities, and gain first-hand experience on their own – while having fun at the same time – at KidZania, the world’s fastest growing education brand, which recently opened its largest indoor site in the world in Bangkok.
Located on the fifth floor of Siam Paragon (although you have to enter via escalator at the Paragon Passage on the 4th floor), KidZania opened with a red carpet preview event filled with celebrity children during the last week of March.
Bangkok’s newest – and probably biggest – educational playground covers a floor space in excess of 10,000sqm, where realistic replicas of city streets, buildings, utilities, and vehicles were meticulously recreated to provide children 4-14 years of age the opportunity to experience the jobs of adults through role-playing in more than 80 different professions. The activities teach children essential life skills such as independent decision-making, teamwork, and money management.
KidZania Bangkok is the 12th KidZania in the world and the largest built indoors, anywhere,” says KidZania CEO and founder, Xavier Lopez Ancona, who graced the preview event. “At KidZania, we give children the opportunity to try real-world professions. They will have lots of fun, but at the same time learn important skills.” Ancona’s company invested Bt10 million for the Bangkok project.
“Our focus is on trying to make their experiences as real as possible, which is why we partner with real-world organizations in setting up establishments in KidZania and creating experiences for kids based on reality rather than fantasy, and with actual careers authenticated by our partner organizations,” added Scott C. Schubert, CEO of KidZania Bangkok.
The establishments where kids will work are all familiar places and carry familiar brands from the real world so that they will really feel they are doing adult jobs, and are not in fantasyland.
What really makes this new educational attraction something exciting for parents to take their kids to, is that among the many different professions that children give a try, they don’t just get to work at these jobs, they also get paid like adults – under the KidZania currency called “kidZo.”
For example, kids can use the kidZos that they have earned to pay for tuition fees at a KidZania university and get a degree that will qualify them for higher paying jobs in another KidZania establishment. Or, they can use their ‘kidZos’ to pay for lessons at a driving school and obtain a driving license that then qualifies them to drive kid-sized cars inside KidZania. They can also put their earnings in a bank, where they will receive interest in the form of additional ‘kidZos’ that can be used on a future occasion.
“KidZabua helps kid learn the value of money, the importance of saving, and the need to make choices on how to spend money,” says Schubert.
KidZania can accommodate nearly 4,000 children a day and approximately one million are expected to experience this educational phenomenon from KidZania Bangkok in its first year of operation.
Kidzania is open 10 a.m.- 5 p.m. Monday- Friday and 10 a.m.- 3 p.m. and 2-9 p.m. on weekends. Tickets can be purchased at KidZania at Siam Paragon or ThaiTicketMajor.
Contact Details:
KidZania
5th Floor Paragon
www.kidzania.co.th
www.facebook.com/KidZaniaBangkok
