Bridging contexts and interpretations: Mobile blogging on art museum field trips

In this study of art museum field trips by high school students, we investigate the ways in which features of different social and mobile technologies, specifically blogs and mobile phones, are able to bridge and support meaning making in young people’s encounters with contemporary art. Empirical material is presented from Gidder, a web-based learning environment with a mobile blogging feature. Through close examination of students’ use of contextual resources and the writing and editing of blog entries, this study contributes a deeper understanding of the ways in which digital technologies may be designed for pedagogical use on museum field trips

Chapter 5 Imagining, designing and exhibiting architecture in the digital landscape

Designs for Experimentation and Inquiry examines how digital media is reconfiguring the established worlds of research, education, and professional practice. It reflects on the theoretical, methodological, and ethical issues shaping contemporary engagements with digital learning and offers insights for both analysing and intervening in digital learning practices. This insightful volume fills a gap in the current literature by bringing together experiences from Sociocultural Studies of Learning, Science and Technology Studies, and Design Studies. Each chapter is an innovative case study, examining a different aspect of digital media’s role in research, education and professional practice

Chapter 5 Imagining, designing and exhibiting architecture in the digital landscape

Designs for Experimentation and Inquiry examines how digital media is reconfiguring the established worlds of research, education, and professional practice. It reflects on the theoretical, methodological, and ethical issues shaping contemporary engagements with digital learning and offers insights for both analysing and intervening in digital learning practices. This insightful volume fills a gap in the current literature by bringing together experiences from Sociocultural Studies of Learning, Science and Technology Studies, and Design Studies. Each chapter is an innovative case study, examining a different aspect of digital media’s role in research, education and professional practice

Developing an interactive tabletop application for ‘Creative Interpretation’ in art museums

This paper presents the design and implementation of an interactive application - TACTEC - for multi-touch tables in art museums. With focus on visitor participant experiences we propose an application that promotes visitors engagement through the development of creative activities using interactive technologies.UiO -Universitetet i Oslo(undefined

Teenage Visitor Experience: Classification of Behavioral Dynamics in Museums

Teenagers' engagement in museums is much talked about but little research has been done to understand their behavior and inform design. Findings from co-design sessions with teenagers suggested they value games and stories when thinking about enjoyable museum tours. Informed by these findings and working with a natural history museum, we designed: a story-based tour (Turning Point) and a game-based tour (Haunted Encounters), informed by similar content. The two strategies were evaluated with 78 teenagers (15-19 years old) visiting the museum as part of an educational school trip. We assessed teenagers' personality in class; qualitative and quantitative data on their engagement, experience, and usability of the apps were collected at the museum. The triangulation of quantitative and qualitative data show personality traits mapping into different behaviors. We offer implications for the design of museum apps targeted to teenagers, a group known as difficult to reach

Dispensing with formalities in art education research

This article investigates how high school students master and appropriate concepts in aesthetics and modern art in art history classes and in art museums. It is argued that distinctions between schools and museums as places of formal and informal learning, respectively, are not useful analytical categories for understanding complex meaning making processes.

"What is 'the Concept'?" Sites of Conceptual Formation in a Touring Architecture Workshop

This article investigates the development of conceptual understanding in adolescents as a trajectory that spans physical and institutional boundaries. The study follows a group of secondary school students as they engage in a series of museum-led workshop activities related to architecture. A sociocultural approach frames our analysis of the structuring resources that are central to the students’ emergent understanding of a key architectural design concept over a two-day period

“How do you know that?” A study of narrative and mediation at an archaeological excavation site

The public’s growing interest in archaeology in recent years is reflected in increased visits to excavation sites, part of a trend coined in the research as Public Archaeology. Public visits are often sponsored through museum outreach and education programmes for schools and families, offering diverse activities and encounters with archaeologists in the field. Yet there are few empirical studies of archaeologists’ mediation practices in these settings and what such interactions may mean for visitors’ learning about history and past cultures. This study empirically investigates a museum’s archaeological excavation site as a setting for students’ meaning making in the subject of history at the upper secondary level (17–19 years old). Interactional data from a school field trip to an excavation site are analysed to explore which archaeological knowledge, narratives, and semiotic resources archaeologists draw on when communicating interpretations of Norwegian history to this learner public. In contrast to developments in archaeological research perspectives over several decades, our analysis identifies processual archaeology as the predominant narrative that archaeologists’ draw on in their interactions with the young people visiting the site. We reflect on the implications of this finding in light of the educational aims, which focus on communicating the complex relationship between archaeology and historical interpretations. The overall aim of the article is to contribute to the development of learning perspectives and research methods that may be relevant for museums’ educational practices at archaeological excavation sites