FUSE Project Update

Rock 'n' roll seems to be in the air! Along with our own AC/DC exhibition, two new rock exhibitions have opened overseas. Beatles to Bowie: the 60s Exposed is on at the National Portrait Gallery in London, while Who Shot Rock 'n' Roll? recently opened at the Brooklyn Museum, New York. Both tell the story of rock 'n' roll using the photographer as the chronicler and image maker. The Brooklyn Museum exhibition has an interesting 'Teacher Packet' you might want to take a look at while the NPG has an interactive that allows you to upload your photograph to a period music magazine cover.

On the homefront it's been a bit quiet for the past fortnight with Julian on the road with the DocU Project. We have, however, managed to start sourcing collection items for our 'pop up' and 'event' modules on our intereactive timeline. Our favourites so far have been the 'Women's Weekly' supplements 'Teenage Weekly' which are full of 1960s-style fashion, muisc and agony aunt advice!

Remember me?

Poster advertising 'Chain' at Bertie's nightclub, Melbourne, 1970. Performing Arts Collection.

Sorry about the shameful silence on the blog front! Julian and I have been very busy trying to wrestle the VCN monster to the ground. We have been trawling through the Performing Arts Collection for weeks now and have found some fantastic material to use in our Australian Music, Circus, and Creative Process resource packages. We have just started work on the first major element of the Australian music project, an intereactive timeline looking at popular music in Australia from 1955 to 2005. The images here are from KE EMu, our collection management system and show just some of the amazing material we have to work with.

 

The Future of Museums

Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame orinially uploaded to Flickr on July 10, 2006by ricardo.martins

Over the past two weeks ABC Radio National's 'Future Tense' have aired about 'The Future of Museums'. One of the things that came across strongly in both Part 1 and Part 2 was the need for greater collaboration between curatorial, education and public program staff in museums to ensure that we communicate the 'magic' of collections in a way that is accessible to every Tom, Dick and Harriet.

So props to us...we are on the right track!

Caz

The Learning Federation Pilot Project

Sorry there hasn't been a post for a while. I have been wading through The Learning Federation Museum & Educational Content Exchange Final Report. At 122 pages it is an detailed review of the TLF's pilot project between the Powerhouse, Museum Victoria, National Museum of Australia and 15 primary and secondary schools from Victoria, South Australa, New South Wales and Tasmania.

The report provides an overview of the processes and systems TLF used to procure, quality assure and deliver content made available by the museums for education users. It also analyses the ways in which teachers and students engaged with the TLF's interactive online environment, Scootle Sandbox.

The results at an upper level are very encouraging with over 92% of teachers and 82% of students agreeing that the 'online learning environment and its collaborative tools assisted students learning'. The finer detail, however, reveals the expected gaps between museum, educator and TLF understanding and expectations.

Reading this document alongside the VCN2 FUSE GOTME document it is clear that DEECD have taken on board and tried to remedy many of the stumbling blocks of the TLF Pilot. This should be very comforting for our VCN2 team! Improvements include the ability for contributor to provide greatly reduced metadata sets for learning object (which is much more in line with how museums do things) and a more self-regulatory quality assurance regime.

If you are interested in dipping into the document you I'd suggest reading the section entitled 'What the case studies tell us' and appendices 1-3 for specific examples on online collaborative activities created by the teachers. Appendix 5 also provides a good list of online references.

So there it is, another boring but strangely fascinating report summarised for you!

Caz

Australia's Cultural Portal

Glasses worn by Barry Humphries as Dame Edna, the Arts Centre's Performing Arts Collection

Do you guys know about this site? It was created by the federal government some years ago but it is quite a good one stop shop for leads on all kinds of performing arts including rock music, dance, circus, opera, theatre and comedy. The Arts Centre's collections are linked to some pages too which is always pleasing!

Some of the links are better than other (quite a few to Wikipedia) but it is definately worth keeping in mind. You can also search by audience (children, families and young people!) which can be handy.

Have a great weekend

Caz

Cool software

Hanna and Dan have forwarded on some great links to software we may be able to use to generate content for our VCN projects. They are:

• Kodu a new visual programming language used to create video games which are especially engaging for children as they use icon based language.
• Photosynth allows you to make a series of flat photographs into a immersive 3D experience.
• Google SketchUp7 kids have been using this one to create things on Dan's Indoor Laneway Project.

If you come across any other (or can think of some good uses for these ones) let me know!

Caz

Fast facts about teens and the Net

• According to a recent survey by America's Pew Research Centre close to 75% of teenagers see themselves not only as Web users but as content creators. There are lots of good facts and figures on this site about internet usage across the generations.
• Not long ago the Jewish Womens Archive in the US ran a program for a group of teenagers and this is what they noticed about their relationship with the Web.
• There is also lots of information online about the 'digital natives' and their preferred learning styles which makes interesting reading.

Enjoy!

Caz