User-centred design of flexible hypermedia for a mobile guide: Reflections on the hyperaudio experience

A user-centred design approach involves end-users from the very beginning. Considering users at the early stages compels designers to think in terms of utility and usability and helps develop the system on what is actually needed. This paper discusses the case of HyperAudio, a context-sensitive adaptive and mobile guide to museums developed in the late 90s. User requirements were collected via a survey to understand visitors’ profiles and visit styles in Natural Science museums. The knowledge acquired supported the specification of system requirements, helping defining user model, data structure and adaptive behaviour of the system. User requirements guided the design decisions on what could be implemented by using simple adaptable triggers and what instead needed more sophisticated adaptive techniques, a fundamental choice when all the computation must be done on a PDA. Graphical and interactive environments for developing and testing complex adaptive systems are discussed as a further step towards an iterative design that considers the user interaction a central point. The paper discusses how such an environment allows designers and developers to experiment with different system’s behaviours and to widely test it under realistic conditions by simulation of the actual context evolving over time. The understanding gained in HyperAudio is then considered in the perspective of the developments that followed that first experience: our findings seem still valid despite the passed time

Converting Family Into Fans: How the Comtemporary Jewish Museum Expanded Its Reach

The last in a series of 10 case studies explores how The Contemporary Jewish Museum in SanFrancisco worked to attract families of all backgrounds and build the next generation of museum supporters. It describes how the museum convened focus groups to better understand the needs of families with young children, designed programs and exhibitions to meet those needs, offered family discounts and entered into community partnerships to build awareness of the museum's offerings.Although The Contemporary Jewish Museum sought to attract families, it did not want to become a children's museum. It therefore took extra efforts to balance the needs of children and adults. It worked to manage parents' expectations, created spaces for children to work on activities and trained its staff to draw families to areas most appropriate for children.These efforts resulted in a nearly nine-fold increase in family visitors over seven years, the report finds. Authors suggest that the museum's successes relied in part on a nuanced understanding of its target audiences, mutually beneficial partnerships with schools and libraries and careful evaluation and refinement of engagement strategies.

The Image as a Communication Tool for Virtual Museums. Narration and the Enjoyment of Cultural Heritage

The challenge of contemporary museums is to make content accessible to a wider audience; in this way information related to the good becomes more communicative and usable in order to enhance its uniqueness. Accessibility goes through an innovative communication of content: the Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) that are increasingly part of people’s daily lives. Communication in most cases occurs visually, so ICTs are increasingly focusing on a rethinking of this expressive form; images become a better support for high-quality data transfer

Museums as disseminators of niche knowledge: Universality in accessibility for all

Accessibility has faced several challenges within audiovisual translation Studies and gained great opportunities for its establishment as a methodologically and theoretically well-founded discipline. Initially conceived as a set of services and practices that provides access to audiovisual media content for persons with sensory impairment, today accessibility can be viewed as a concept involving more and more universality thanks to its contribution to the dissemination of audiovisual products on the topic of marginalisation. Against this theoretical backdrop, accessibility is scrutinised from the perspective of aesthetics of migration and minorities within the field of the visual arts in museum settings. These aesthetic narrative forms act as modalities that encourage the diffusion of ‘niche’ knowledge, where processes of translation and interpretation provide access to all knowledge as counter discourse. Within this framework, the ways in which language is used can be considered the beginning of a type of local grammar in English as lingua franca for interlingual translation and subtitling, both of which ensure access to knowledge for all citizens as a human rights principle and regardless of cultural and social differences. Accessibility is thus gaining momentum as an agent for the democratisation and transparency of information against media discourse distortions and oversimplifications

Urban adolescents\u27 field trip experiences: a phenomenological perspective

Evidence is mounting that field trips are vanishing from school life, as districts across the nation report reductions and eliminations of these outings because of funding concerns. The matter is of special importance in urban areas, where a wealth of museums are situated nearby neighborhoods in which poor and minority children live and attend school. These children are absent from the museum, less likely to visit with family because of the powerful exclusionary effect that educational attainment and income level have on museum socialization, making school the place where a connection to the museum is formed. However, opportunities for learning in museums are diminished in multiple ways for urban students, who receive less arts and humanities instruction and more instruction emphasizing basic literacies intended to improve achievement on high-stakes standardized tests. Further, the social, emotional, and educational value of field trips are underappreciated by the formal education community because of epistemological differences in what constitutes learning, which tend to emphasize cognitive gains that are common to the school environment, while ignoring the motivating and satisfying aspects of learning in out-of-school settings. The purpose of this phenomenological inquiry is to explore what meaning or significance urban students derive from their field trip experiences in the context of educational opportunities provided at school. Using a critical lens, this study problematizes field trips as a curriculum issue to shed light on what is lost to students as learners when these experiences are not offered by school. The participants in this study are nine middle-school students and two teachers from two schools located in a large Midwestern city. Through qualitative procedures of interviews and observations, three key findings emerged that describe students\u27 field trip experiences: 1) students gain appreciation and empathy from their field trip experiences; 2) students desire more autonomy in their learning experiences and perceive learning as defined by classroom routines, and 3) students value learning as a social activity, in which interaction with peers is paramount to their experience of learning. These findings contribute to a better understanding of the meaning and significance of field trip experiences to students

Planning Effective School Field Trips For Elementary Students

Field trips for elementary school students are valuable contributors towards improved learning, motivation, and student social interactions. Unfortunately, they are often underutilized in the support of student learning due to several factors: often teachers do not know how to use field trips to their best advantage, often planning field trips is time consuming and difficult, teachers are pressured to justify field trips in terms of links to measurable educational standards, and preservice teachers seldom are instructed in their effective use. To address these concerns, a guidebook for preservice and current teachers has been developed. In it, research based teaching strategies for learning in informal learning environments and instruction for planning the logistics of a school field trip are presented

Blunting the tensions between informal and formal education in science : reforming the relationship between the school and the science museum in Greece

In this paper, I explore the relationship between formal and informal approaches to science education as mechanisms for dissemination of scientific knowledge. I then posit the combination of specific characteristics from the two approaches into a unified process of non-formal science education. In the second part of the paper, I describe the different types of science museum and present a taxonomy with respect to their educational mission. Finally, I describe the role of the three approaches in the educational system and I illustrate each one with specific examples from science museumspeer-reviewe

THE MEANING OF PARTICIPATION Detecting the space for inclusive strategies in the Finnish and German museum context

Museoiden yleisötyöstrategioissa osallisuus, moninaisuus ja inkluusio ovat yleisiä käsitteitä. Ne sanallistavat museoiden motivaation ja tarpeen täyttää niihin kohdistuvan yhteiskunnallisen odotuksen olla kaikille avoimia. Jokainen saa käydä museossa ja osallistua aktiviteetteihin. Mutta onko tämän osallistuminen sellaista, joka edistää strategioissa mainittua osallisuutta tai inkluusiota? Kriittisen ja etnografisen tarkastelun kautta kattotermi ”yleisötyö” suomalaisella ja saksalaisella museokentällä paljastaa, että osallisuuden ja inkluusion käsitteet voidaan ymmärtää eri tasoilla. Ne voivat viitata esteettömään tiedonsaantiin ja tiloissa kulkemiseen tai ennalta suunniteltujen aktiviteettien toteuttamiseen. Museoalan kirjallisuus toteaa tämänkaltaisen osallistamisen riittämättömäksi museoiden tavoitteen ollessa osallistujien kuuluvuuden tunne. Siten, museota tarkastellaan kriittisesti käsitteenä, jossa osallistavan yleisötyön yleisimpiä käytäntöjä teoretisoidaan ja kyseenalaistetaan. Kuuluvuuden tunteeseen sisältyvät merkityksellisyys, samaistuttavuus ja omistajuus, joiden saavuttaminen yleisötyön kontekstissa kaipaa ohjenuoria. Tarjonta, jonka odotetaan edistävän strategioissa esiintyvää osallisuutta museoissa, esiintyy kahden ääripään, ennalta suunniteltujen aktiviteettien ja jaetun vallan näyttelysuunnittelussa välillä. Tämä synnyttää tarpeen tarkastella yleisötyössä käytettyjen termien, kuten osallistumisen, inkluusion, moninaisuuden ja saavutettavuuden sisältöjä. Käytettyjen käsitteiden ymmärtämistä voidaan parantaa, kun niitä tarkastellaan niiden käytännön merkityksen tasolla ja arvioidaan, toteutuvatko nämä odotukset nykyisillä yleisötyön vakiometodeilla. Ymmärtämisen kautta voidaan luoda uusia tekemisen tapoja ja siten todellista osallisuutta, joka voi mahdollistaa osallistujan inkluusion museossa. Koska suurinosa museokokemuksista luodaan näyttelysaleissa ja vastaanotossa työskentelevän henkilökunnan myötävaikutuksesta, ymmärtäminen voi edistää myös asiakaspalveluhenkilökunnan arvostusta, joka ei yleensä ole osallinen näyttelysuunnitteluprosessien ensimmäisissä vaiheissa. Pohdinta kumuloituu museon ja yleisön välisen suhteen käsitteeseen, jota havainnoillistetaan museo-yleisö-suhteen kaaviossa (museum-audience relationship blueprint). Tässä suhteessa osallistujien valta määritellä ja päättää omien kokemustensa ehdot ja puitteet on jakautunut kentällä jokseenkin epätasaisesti. Todellisen osallisuuden ja inkluusion nimissä tätä suhdetta tulee voida avata. Kysymys on lopulta osallistujien todellisesta osallisuudesta ja omistajuudesta, museoiden sidosryhmien tuntemuksesta, ylläpidetyistä suhteista entisten osallistujien ja museoiden välillä ja näkymättöminen esteiden tunnistamisesta ja tunnustamisesta yleisötyön kontekstissa. Tämä väitöskirja ehdottaa inkluusio-orientoitunutta osallistumismallia (inclusiondirected participation model), joka perustuu palvelumuotoiluun pohjautuvaan lähestymistapaan. Osallistumismallissa yhdistyvät museokentän odotukset osallistumiseen liittyvästä yleisötyöstä ja palvelumuotoilun teoria ja filosofia. Osallistumisen viiden osa-alueen – tutkimuksen; yhteistyön ja kommunikoinnin; kestävyyden; mielekkyyden ja omistajuuden; sekä vastoinkäymisten – kautta konsepti ehdottaa osallistumisen iteratiivista sykliä, joka mahdollistaa osallistujien vallan yhteissuunnitteluprosessissa, edistää kävijätutkimusta yksittäisissä instituutioissa ja huomioi kehittämishankkeiden avoimen luonteen. Tämän ehdotuksen tavoitteena on siis edistää palvelumuotoilun syvällisempää tunnustamista ohjenuoraksi museoille, kun tavoitteena on saavuttaa uuden museologian (New Museology) asettamat vaatimukset osallistumiselle ja edistää museoiden yhteiskunnallisen vastuun toteutumista meille kaikille kuuluvasta kulttuuriperinnöstä.In museums’ strategies for Audience Development, concepts such as participation, diversity, and inclusion are common. They state the museums’ initial motivations and need to fulfill their societal xpectations, which is to be “open for all.” Everyone is welcome to visit museums and take part in the activities therein. However, does this participation promote the type of participation or inclusion mentioned in their strategies? Through a critical and ethnographic exploration of the umbrella term “Audience Development” in the Finnish and German museum domains, it becomes evident that the very meanings of the concepts of participation and inclusion are understood on differing levels. They can indicate barrier-free information and access to spaces or the realization of pre-designed activities. The literature on the museum field states this type of participation insufficient when museums aim for the feeling of belonging among participants. The critical examination discusses the museum as a concept and theorizes and questions the most common practices in participative Audience Development. The “feeling of belonging” includes meaningfulness, relevancy, and ownership. Notably, achieving these within the context of Audience Development still lacks specific guidelines. Moreover, the offerings expected to promote participation in museums occur at two extremes: pre-designed activities and shared power in exhibition design. A need to examine the contents of the terms used in the strategies such as “participation,” “inclusion,” “diversity,” and “accessibility” is evident. The understanding of these terms can be improved when they are examined on the level of their practical functions and evaluated as to whether the standard methods of Audience Development realize these practical expectations. The emerging understanding promotes new ways of doing and, thus, “real” participation, which can lead to the participants’ inclusion in museums. Most museum experiences are created with the influence of frontline staff, so this understanding can also promote the value laid on this portion of the staff that is usually not included in the first phases of the exhibition planning processes. This discussion evolves to focus on the museum-audience relationship, which will be exemplified in the form of a museum-audience blueprint. In this relationship, the participants’ power over the terms and circumstances of their experiences is divided unevenly in the field. In the name of “real” participation and inclusion, this relationship should be able to be opened. The issue eventually concerns participants’ involvement and ownership, the museums’ knowledge about stakeholders, sustainable relationships with former participants, and recognizing and acknowledging the invisible barriers in Audience Development. By leveraging the Service Design-based approach, this dissertation proposes an inclusion-directed participation model that combines the participatory expectations of the museum field with the tools and philosophy of Service Design. Through the five parts of participation, namely, research, collaboration and communication, sustainability, meaningfulness and ownership, and obstacles, the concept proposes an iterative cycle of participation that would allow participants to influence the codesign process, promote visitor research in individual institutions, and acknowledge the open-ended nature of developmental projects. This proposal aims to promote the acknowledgment of Service Design as a guideline in the museum field more profoundly when the goal is to achieve the participatory aims of New Museology and promote the fulfillment of the museums’ societal responsibilities concerning access to and participation in culture