(bright music) - Sensory friendly activities can be hard to find.

That's where Ogden's Dinosaur Park & Museum steps in with their sensory friendly nights.

Here to tell us more is Noah Erb.

Welcome Noah.

- Hey, thank you for having me.

- What is it about dinosaurs that gets people excited and wanting to learn more and just kind of draws their attention, especially in the summertime?

- Yeah, I mean there's so much going on at our Dinosaur Park & Museum.

So we have sculptures on the outside where you can experience like real life-sized dinosaurs.

And on the indoor museum we have our geology area with all of our gems and jewels and things like that.

All the sparkly that people like to see and our fossils and stuff in there.

So when you're in there you can see the real size and scope of dinosaurs and it just makes it feel like they truly come to life.

And that's kind of inspirational and it sparks curiosity, I think, for everyone.

- What sparked the idea of sensory friendly nights?

- So we just recognize that we have a community of individuals.

A lot of people really want to come check out dinosaurs, there's a lot of people that wanna see them.

And the typical museum environment is just not sensory friendly.

You have a lot of sounds, you have animatronics, a lot of flashing lights and different things going on.

So for individuals that might have PTSD or ADHD or autism where they might struggle with that overly sensory environment, we wanted to be a little more inclusive and accessible for those individuals to really come and enjoy the experience without feeling overwhelmed or not being able to be themselves and be able to enjoy what we have to offer.

- I think that does so much and goes so far in creating positive memories at museums for children.

- Yeah, exactly.

So that's really our goal is because we're so ingrained in the Northern Utah community and especially in the Ogden area, we want everyone to feel like they're welcome, like they're safe and comfortable when they come and visit our museum.

And that they don't feel like they need to hide or change who they are just to be able to enjoy their experience while they're with us.

- Yeah.

And sometimes for parents, they feel like they have to mask behaviors and things like that and- - Yeah, exactly.

So that's kind of the goal of these nights is that they don't have to mask those behaviors.

Like we wanna welcome them in, we wanna make them feel like they're at home and that way these lights are lower, the noises are off, and they can really go through the park and enjoy it as they'd like to.

- Well, thank you so much Noah, for sharing this information.

If you would like to learn more about what's happening at Ogden's Dinosaur Park & Museum, we're talking about sensory friendly nights.

It's the first Friday of the month from 3:00 PM until close.

You can learn more on their website at dinosaurpark.org.

I'm Liz Adeola and thank you for watching "Contact."

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Hi, I'm Liz Adeola, the host of Contact, a show that connects you with local events and organizations that serve your community.

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