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…

The pilot program, Morning at the Museum (MAM), was offered to children (ages 3-5) and their caregivers weekly for six weeks at the Reynolda House Museum of American Art (RHMAA). Both children and adults explored RHMAA through hands-on activities that encouraged play, movement, observation, music, and art-making. Each session explored a theme…

Plays and toys have an important place in the education of children. Children learn by seeing and doing rather than reading, listening and understanding. Play is an important "job" for children. The basic function of plays is to facilitate children's adaptation to the world. Children can understand the real world by playing. They deal…

The serious need for reform of the Leaving Certificate Art Curriculum in Ireland sets the context for this article, which tracks the social and political factors that shaped the emergence of art education in Ireland before and after the formation of the Free State. This historical framing creates the background for the training of art teachers…

We can support students' deep engagement with content through innovative delivery. The techniques developed at the Field Museum in Chicago to share science knowledge through storytelling can provide inspiration for both formal and informal educators.

In recent years, the concept of museum has attracted attention in teaching of social studies which is an interdisciplinary course that attaches importance to in-school and out-of-school processes. Metaphor is to express perceptions on a particular subject figuratively. In this research, it is aimed to reveal perceptions of social studies teacher…

As an informal learning context, science museums offer opportunities for visitors to engage in shared meaning-making as they interpret the concepts and phenomena presented in exhibits. As visitors engage in social meaning-making, they may provide support by scaffolding others' learning. Scaffolding describes support that is tailored to learners'…

History museums sometimes struggle to communicate history's relevance to visitors. By reframing historic interpretation through the lens of environmental sustainability and by developing issue-based exhibits to bridge past and present, Accokeek Foundation (which runs the National Colonial Farm) has made colonial history more meaningful to…

The Civil War ended in 1865. From 2011-2015, Civil War sesquicentennial events took place around the nation. The National Mississippi River Museum & Aquarium used the opportunity to feature two exhibits on the critical role that the river played during the Civil War. Both exhibits highlighted contributions to the war effort by the surrounding…

Research has shown that supporting tinkering and exploration promotes a wide range of STEM related literacies. However, the open-endedness of tinkering environments makes it difficult to know whether learners' exploration is productive or not. This is especially true in museum spaces, where dwell times are short and facilitators lack a history of…

Starting as a pilot to increase parent involvement in a partnership school, the Cultural Ambassadors Program ultimately allowed parents and their children to communicate deeply about their experiences in museums and memories of their communities. Looking at art and discussing artists' processes allowed participants to connect art with community…

A cadre of professional folklorists came together to provide insight into their unique programs and roles directing state folk arts and folklife programs within or in partnership with university-based museums. Partnerships explored in this article include: (1) Traditional Arts Indiana at Indiana University's Mathers Museum (Jon Kay); (2) The…

This article describes how one state museum's mission is to illuminate the natural world and inspire its conservation. Educational specialists from the museum achieve this mission by helping educators across the state use and enhance the natural resources available on their school grounds as a teaching tool. The article shares a lesson that…

Access to community cultural institutions such as museums, zoos, and theaters has the potential to improve students' educational experiences. This article estimates the impact of School in the Park, a museum-based educational program for low-income students that takes place within the cultural institutions and museums of San Diego's Balboa Park.…

To explore the potential contribution of parents' causal talk to preschooler's emerging scientific literacy and related interests, we observed 153 parent-child dyads playing together in a museum and in the lab. As in previous work, the frequency with which parents referenced causal information in their speech predicted the strength of their…