The Odditoreum

Image: Powerhouse 'Photo of the Day' blog

Yesterday Robin mentioned the Powerhouse exhibition, The Odditoreum so I thought you might be interested in finding out a little more about it. The Odditoreum began life as an idea for a small school holiday program but became a popular exhibition, book and limited edition print. The project had many constraints including a budget of only $7000 (excluding staff time) and was conceived as a 'low-tech' way of engaging visitors with the permanent collection.

The show was 'curated' by children's book author Shaun Tan. Tan chose 10 objects from a long list he was sent by the Public Programs Producer who had compiled and refined the list in consultation with curators, registrars and conservators. He then wrote fictitious labels of approx. 100 words for each object. Visitors were also invited to write their own labels. The 'real' label information was also included but only at the end of the exhibition.

The show was a big hit with audiences of all ages and is a good reminder that you don't always need a million bucks to pull off a good idea. It is also a good 'real-life' example of a the type of engagement people are also seeking online.

Virtual Museum Experiences

Originally uploaded to Flickr on June 12, 2007by bcg8

As we struggle to get our heads around how best to present ourselves in the virtual world, the Smithsonian is, of course, light years ahead. When you have a spare moment check out these amazing online projects. The first is the Ghosts of A Chance alternative reality game which was held last year. The project was set up as a way for visitors to interact with the collection at the Luce Foundation Centre for American Art. The project ran for three months and attracted 6,000 online visitors as well as over 200 on-site visitors. It was a pretty crazy combination of creating, gaming, online communication and detective work and it takes some time to get your head around (reading about it after the fact), but what a concept!

The other project takes virtual reality even further. This is the Smithsonian Latino Virtual Museum hosted on Second Life. This really is out there! Basically you set up an avatar for yourself in Second Life and he/she walks through the Museum and visits the exhibitions.
Have fun!
Caz

The Networked Student

Uploaded on August 31, 2005by Robin Hutton

Here's a little light reading from the Australasian Journal of Educational Technology. In her article, 'The networked student model for construction of personal learning environments: Balancing teacher control and student autonomy', Wendy Drexler provides an interesting insight into the networked teacher/ student relationship using a test case undertaken with a group of 15 k-12 students in south-eastern USA. It's a bit long but if you are interested in this area it might be worth printing off to read on a 'rainy day'!

A website really designed for kids!

I found this website by the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery education arm and thought I'd share it with you. It is one of the rare sites I've found that really seems to be designed with children in mind. Many of the others I've seen all have that corporate branding look that adults are all so keen on whereas this one with its lovely illustrations seems much more child-friendly to me (I plan to check it out with my own kids to test my theory!). I can imagine this sort of vibe working well for our Circus project.

If you have time the web links at the bottom of the page are also quite interesting especially Bedazzled the kids online fashion magazine done with a Flash plug-in and Bemused which is the Museum's interactive page for kids where they can upload their drawing, watch videos etc.

Like Sands Through the Hourglass...

Uploaded to Flickr on June 15, 2009by choreographics

Over the past few weeks Julian, Paul and I have been researching interactive timelines to try and pick apart the functionalities that might work for our timeline. Some of the more interesting ones we have looked at inlcude:

BBC's British History timeline

MOMA's Colour Chart timeline

Biography.com's Black History timeline

The Museum of London's Exploring 20th century London

Design company White Void's use of Flash in presenting layered information

We are hoping to start talking to Flash developers some time after Easter so if you know of any other good timelines please let us know!

Don't Dream It's Over...

Thanks for making me feel so welcome at the EFYP meeting yesterday and for responding so enthusiastically to our project. As Julian mentioned we have just finished most of the 70s and 80s section of our timeline but are struggling a bit with the late 80s/early 90s. Not that we have a lack of material rather we have too much! A funny thing happens when you come to examine recent history especially if you lived through that period as a young adult. This is the period we usually hold dear to us for the rest of our lives. It is a time (before real adult responsibilities set in!) when we are free to indulge all our passions and we often find it hard to separate things that were important to us from things that have been shown to be historically significant.

What/who was important to you from 1985-2000? We have a pretty good selection of bands and significant single and album releases from alternative to commercial but we are now trying to narrow down our themes. Some of the ones we are toying with are the resurgence of the music festival; women in rock/pop, and the advent of national FM radio (especially TripleJ).

We'd love to know what you guys think. Were there any pivotal moments for you? Seminal bands, venues, feastivals, movements? Don't be shy - all feedback will be greatly appreciated.

Caz

'Let's Make More Crowns', or the danger of not looking closely at your web metrics!

Kids taking part in the 'Thriller Experience' linked to the Powerhouse's exhibition 'The 80s Are Back' Image: Copyright Powerhouse Museum

Welcome to the first VCN team blog for 2010 especially to our newest member Paul. Given all the great work EFY did on the Education website before Christmas I thought you might be interested in this post from the Powerhouse. It looks at the reasons why they chose to put up certain content for their kids pages, how it has been used and by whom. The Powerhouse take their web metrics very seriously and are considered leaders in the field. I think that this post shows very graphically why it is prudent to do so.

Caz