Learning in Museums

Museum learning is a key objective for the Australian Museum. AMARC has been studying museum visitors and their learning since 1994. This section contains papers, reports and presentations from a range of AMARC projects.

• Musing on Learning
• Museums and Organisational Learning
• Understanding museum learning from the visitor's perspective
• Making a difference: what have we learned about visitor learning?
• MARVEL: Museums Actively Researching Visitor Experiences and Learning
• Design and learning in museum exhibitions
• Why Learning? Seminar papers (2002)
• Online Museum Learning Resources

Musing on Learning

In March, 1999 a seminar, Musing on Learning, was held at the Australian Museum to create a dialogue between different groups interested in museum learning - academics, researchers and museum professionals to uncover possibilities for new research directions, communication initiatives and approaches.

• Musing on Learning Introduction (PDF 12k)
• Museums and Interpretive Communities (PDF 40k)
• Developing a Learning Culture in Museums 1 (PDF 41k)
• Developing a Learning Culture in Museums 2 'Learning about Learning' (PDF 36k)
• Finding Evidence of Visitor Learning (PDF 44k)
• Making a School Excursion a Learning Experience 1: A Work in Progress (PDF 28k)
• Making a School Excursion a Learning Experience 2: The Australian Museum (PDF 20k)
• Young Learners - Planning for the Under 5's (PDF 20k)

Museums and Organisational Learning

This paper, co-authored by Lynda Kelly and Tim Sullivan, described the way the Australian Museum positioned visitors and learning when developing the 1998 Corporate Strategic Plan. The paper also touched on some aspects of thinking about learning in the sense of organisational culture and change, creating an environment for the Museum to think more deeply about learning as an outcome for museum visitors.

• Evaluation and Visitor Research Special Interest Group - Australian Papers
  http://www.amol.org.au/evrsig/evrlib.html#auspapers

Understanding museum learning from the visitor's perspective

Doctoral research being undertaken by Lynda Kelly, AMARC, is designed to further understandings about learning from an individual's perspective, while contributing to theoretical discourse about museum learning and education. The research question being studied is How do adult museum visitors describe learning?

Further information

• Understanding Conceptions of Learning 2000 Conference Paper (PDF 150k)
• Researching learning and learning about research 2001 Conference Paper (PDF 355k)
• What is learning ... and why do museums need to do something about it? 2001 Conference Paper (PDF 267k)
• Extending the Lens: a sociocultural approach to understanding museum learning 2002 Conference Abstract
  http://www.amonline.net.au/uncover/abstracts/abstract23.htm
• Understanding Museum Learning From The Visitor's Perspective 2002 Conference Paper http://www.aare.edu.au/indexpap.htm (When you get to this site you need to go to Conference Paper Index, then Brisbane 2002, then to 'K' and the paper code is KEL02014)
• Applying Research to Practice: visitors talk about museums 2003 Symposium Paper (PDF 281KB)
• Museums, 'dumbing down' and entertainment: a visitor perspective 2003 Conference Abstract http://dev.amonline.net.au/uncover/abstracts_2003/abstract04.htm

Making a difference: what have we learned about visitor learning?

The Museum has implemented a vigorous program of audience research over the past five years using a variety of quantitative and qualitative methodologies, including visitor surveys, depth interviews, focus groups, tracking and observational studies. A 1999 paper identified 12 key themes arising from the learning literature, and, through a meta-analysis of audience research and evaluation projects, searched for evidence of visitor learning in relation to each theme. Based on this body of work, an overall picture of visitor learning at the Australian Museum across a broad range of programs and audiences can be drawn.

• What have we learned about visitor learning? (PDF 156k)

MARVEL: Museums Actively Researching Visitor Experiences and Learning

Museums and similar institutions spend a great deal of time, money and effort developing exhibits which facilitate visitor learning. While some methodologies to measure learning effectiveness of exhibits have been developed for specific institutions, there is a need for robust, tested procedures which will be suitable across institutions. Procedures will be used to develop a reliable, practical and useful protocol for measuring the depth and breadth of visitor learning experiences across a range of museums, and used by staff who do not necessarily have evaluation training. To this end, MARVEL has been developed as a collaboration between the University of Technology, Sydney (UTS); the Australian Museum, Sydney; the Royal Botanic Gardens, Sydney; and Environmetrics Pty Ltd, with a range of other cultural institutions being involved as test sites. An Industry Link Seeding Research Grant was received from UTS in 2002/2003 to progress this study.

For further information about MARVEL contact Janette Griffin, Faculty of Education, UTS.

Design and learning in museum exhibitions

A student project was undertaken by Adrienne Kabos, University of Technology, Sydney in 2000-2001. Adrienne gave a presentation about her work at the UNCOVER 2002 Conference.

• Design and learning in museum exhibitions
  http://www.amonline.net.au/uncover/abstracts/abstract02.htm

Museum Learning Resources

• for further information about Museums and Learning see the web links section of AMARC

Learning in Museums documents are only available in PDF format. The FREE Acrobat Reader is required. If you have trouble accessing the PDFs on this page, please email Lynda Kelly.