An important part of our students’ #ASHexperience is being able to apply their learning to real-world situations. This is exactly what our grade 6 social studies learners are currently in the midst of doing, as they delve into putting together museum exhibitions and how a museum is run. The students are hard at work curating exhibitions for one of their class units and come April they will create and run their own museum. The students will all have different roles to fulfill from curator and marketing director to museum cafe manager. Recently, Menno Meijerink from the Rijksmuseum van Oudheden (the National Museum of Antiquities) visited our grade 6 students and spoke to them about how to run a museum.

Menno opened his sessions probing the students about the tasks of a museum or why it is important that museums exist. He was impressed with the range of answers our ASH learners offered up, including; “to safeguard artifacts”, “to inspire people”, “to teach people and show them what came before”. Menno emphasized that we shouldn’t forget to have fun learning at a museum and some of that responsibility lies with the people who work in a museum to ensure the exhibits and experience are appealing, engaging and educational.

This is something he encouraged our budding museum creators to think about when designing and bringing together their exhibits for their museum open days next April. Menno explained how it is important to think about your target audience, as this can have a significant influence on how you construct and curate your exhibition and museum experience.

Other important considerations Menno imparted on our learners was to consider how you market and advertise your exhibition to your target audience as well as thinking about what items to use in creating your exhibition. In some cases, you may have to loan items from other museums or collections and insurance costs for this can have a big overall impact on your budget. Menno also brought along a group of objects and set our ASH learners to task designing an exhibition around these pre-selected items. This was great practice for their upcoming classwork as well as designing their museum open days in April.

Make sure to keep an eye out come April for more information on these open days, we can’t wait to see what our grade 6 puts together!

#ASHexperience #ASHlearns