This article describes a student-led assessment of a writing showcase event sponsored by a composition learning community at an urban R1 university. Participants conducted student-to-student interviews at the semi-annual writing showcase event to help assess whether and how the learning community event supported learning outcomes. The interviews,…

In two studies, Providence Children's Museum investigated caregivers' observations and perceptions of their children's play and learning at the museum. In the first, caregivers (N = 40) were interviewed about what they observed children doing, what they believed children were thinking about, and their own thoughts and actions while watching…

Although burdened by legacies of elitism, exclusion and paternalism, some public museums are attempting to respond to the socio-environmental problems currently facing our planet by developing critical non-formal educational activities to foster consciousness and change. This article explores one such response; a six-week non-formal course…

Stacy Boldrick is a Lecturer in Art Museum and Gallery Studies at the University of Leicester, where she conducts research in iconoclasm and its significance for social groups and institutions. She is the author of "Iconoclasm and the Museum" (Routledge, 2020). In 2013, she collaborated with Tabitha Barber to curate Art Under Attack:…

Museum partnerships can involve significant tensions, especially when these collaborations reach across institutions to blend disciplines such as art and mathematics. Rather than simply being obstacles to overcome, we suggest that tensions arising in multi-institutional, cross-disciplinary collaborations can be highly generative for collaborators,…

Children's museums and exhibitions designed for children are well-thought adult projects; however, children rarely participate in the design process. Visual research methods can provide a remedy for this scarcity of children's agency in determining significant exhibition qualities. The paper will discuss a visual research methodology that empowers…

Creative writing is often thought of as an individual and solitary pursuit. This is partly owing to Romantic (and still popular) notions of "creativity" as residing in highly gifted individuals, but also to the widely held belief that "writing" is a lonely rather than a social activity. The research presented in this paper…

Background: This study builds on a series of studies that examined how augmented reality and various other learning scaffolds can promote deeper conceptual and cognitive understanding among visitors in a science museum. Purpose: We focus specifically on determining the exact affordances of different genres of scaffolds that include augmented…

This paper reports on an interview study with MFA students in two different full-time MFA degree programs in painting. The interviews were conducted as part of two ethnographic studies, each one academic year in length, of art and design schools at two U.S. universities. The goal was to explore the extended process whereby MFA student artists, in…

Informal science learning has drawn the attention of researchers, educators and museum administrators for a long time. However, the problem of how to better support visitors to be more engaged while visiting exhibits and improve informal science learning performance is still missing. Context-aware technologies have the advantages of fostering…

Using a case study of London Zoo's BUGS (Biodiversity Underpinning Global Survival) exhibit, this article assesses the role of experiential learning in raising biodiversity knowledge, concern and potential pro-conservation actions. Using Personal Meaning Mindmapping, a novel method in visitor research, the study examines how adult visitors relate…

Local history projects allow undergraduate students to engage with their surrounding community and forge relationships between universities and museums. By assigning work that requires input from both students and the museums, these projects help create collaborative partnerships as students leave campus to conduct research, participate in and…

Evidence suggests that content incorporated into science museum exhibits remains out of reach for many visitors who are deaf or hard of hearing and who communicate in sign language. The implementation research described in this article was conducted by TERC, Inc. at the Museum of Science (MoS), Boston. The purpose was to examine use of a mobile…

The aim of the OECD Career Readiness project is to identify patterns of teenage attitudes and activities that are associated with better transitions into employment by analysing multiple national longitudinal datasets. This paper looks for further evidence of the link between teenage activities, experiences and career-related thinking and adult…

In this article, we explore how visitors engage with a science museum exhibit that displays controversial topics. Through a case study methodology, we focus on the Brazilian exhibit "Preventing Youth Pregnancy" that delves into teen pregnancy, sexual practices, and sexually transmitted diseases. Using the lens of science communication…