Museum wall of learning #edtech
I may have made the title up, as this video is not about a ‘wall of learning’ but it does showcase what can be done with technology and the need/desire to share and facilitate learning. The original Mashable post was simply about the tech and the multi-touch screen
“The wall … is designed to foster stronger engagement between visitors and individual items in the collection … not just for discovery, but for acting on that discovery. Using the museum’s ArtLens iPad app, visitors can link to the wall to add works to their own custom museum tours.”
Watch and let me know what you think?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gc_GtVvzO4A
YouTube: Transforming the Museum Experience
Here’s what I think:
- This is a great way to introduce a museum’s catalogue of work to students, either in the museum or online (in the classroom. etc.). The student can pick one piece of work (or have one picked for them) and the wall/technology can show related or contradictory work, thus engaging the student and making them think about the work in it’s original context and/or in a new context.
- Many museum’s have more work than they have space to display, so this could be a great way to bring artwork from archives and storage into the public display again.
- Class trip to the museum can start in the classroom with a pre-activity that will direct what the student does or tries to find out when they are in the museum and can continue long after the trip is over and the students are back in class.
- Wouldn’t it be good if it can be personalised, that it could remember who is looking through the catalogue (or use NFC to ‘see’ who is standing in front of it?), so collections can be tailored to the user’ profile? Or that it could be used to question the user on the artwork, the artist, or the sculptor, in collaboration with the app?
The idea behind the wall
“shows an openness and willingness, on museum administrators’ parts, to rethink traditional visiting experiences to achieve their chief goals: In this case, to foster interest and better educate visitors about works of art.”
Love the idea and your link to learning – thank you. i focued on how this could be applied to the corporate L&D setting. Sometimes these things can seem too big to make a start on so why not start by asking previous workshop participants to post either via technology or simply small posters their ocmments and reflections that others can see prior to the workshop or as they arrive.
Hi Caroline – me too, this kind of application can be so ‘easily’ (technically, maybe not financially!) modified for a learning purpose, whether its in a museum or school or corporate headquarters or somewhere else.
Wish I had time, money, and knowledge to try all these things out ;-)
All the best, David
Hi David, interesting posting. Here’s my thoughts:
>Museums do need to do more to engage with their visitors and understand why they visit, what they want out of their visit. This article highlights Falk’s The Museum Visitor Experience http://www.learningtimes.net/bpcp/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Falk-The-Museum-Visitor-Experience.pdf Interesting read as it talks about how its not just the content that visitors go to museums for. Visitors have their own agenda when visiting museums.Equally you could argue people have their own agenda when enrolling on a MOOC.
>Having been to a lot of “open doors” events at various museums I fully appreciate why certain artefacts are displayed. Sometimes though the “open doors” are more interesting than what is out on display.
>I have not yet come across a digital representation of an artefact that beats seeing the real thing up close and personal.
> Quite a lot of museums I’ve had experience with already do the pre-activity packs but they aren’t usually in a digital format.
Hi Alison – thanks for your reply. I don’t think anyone would disagree with you that the digital ‘edition’ will ever beat the real thing (unless it’s a high resolution image of the Mona Lisa that you can’t get near enough to see in the first place?) but as something to enhance the museum experience … ?
All the best, David