Although it is generally geared towards school-aged children, I saw many toddlers and preschoolers who were joining in on the excitement. My kids loved that more than half of these cutting edge robots were interactive! The new exhibit features some of the most innovative and advanced robots of today, gathered from universities and companies from around the world. But two of the robots are home-grown and on loan from our very own University of Pennsylvania. The exhibit is a collaboration between the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, Google.org, and The Boeing Company, and Philadelphia is its first stop during its east coast tour.

Robot Revolution is divided into four visiting areas: Cooperation, Skills, Smarts, and Locomotion. Each area focuses on different uses for robots. The Smarts area, for example, features robots that can learn and develop skills to adapt to different situations and their surroundings. A robot arm that can reprogram itself after learning moves from my daughter is just one example.

As we walked through the exhibit, my children's wide-eyed wonder grew bigger and bigger! My son put his seventh-grade computer science class skills to work when he was able to try his hand at some simple coding on the Roomba vacuum. Meanwhile, my daughter is ready to take on high rollers in Vegas after challenging another robot to a game of blackjack. And, as an animal lover, my favorite was PARO, a therapeutic baby seal robot who has been used to help dementia patients in hospitals and nursing homes around the world. He is rather fuzzy and responds to human touch by moving and making crying sounds. As a long time fan of puzzles, my son's favorite robot was the Cube Solver. He was given a Rubik's Cube to scramble, then returned it to the robot who examined the cube and solved it in just a few seconds. Another favorite was Soccer 'Bots, miniature robots who have been programmed with the rules of soccer and who play entirely on their own without any human input. They play every hour, on the hour, so be sure to wait around for this unique demonstration.

After meeting and interacting with over 40 robots, we ventured to the Robo Garage, which is a demonstration area. Children can watch engineers at work in an open lab. Although my son has always had a love of building and designing, starting with his first set of Legos, this area furthered his interest in computers, technology, and engineering.

Either before or after your exciting day interacting with the world's most advanced computers, head to the IMAX theater to see National Geographic's documentary, "Robots."

My children and I decided to take the train into the city to avoid weekend traffic but there are several garages within an easy walk if you decide to drive, and some street parking is available around the museum. We planned for an afternoon visit after lunch but you could easily spend hours here, so you may want to plan to arrive a little earlier in the day.

Robot Revolution is at the Franklin Institute now through April 2 and is open daily with extended evening hours Thursday through Saturday. Your ticket price includes general admission to the rest of the museum.

All photos courtesy of Darryl Peveto for the Franklin Institute.