Museum Scouts

As an EU Comenius 2.1 project, a main aim of MuseumScouts was to create materials to support teachers who were interested in working with this model of teaching and learning. During the project we gathered evidence of the experience and outcomes of working in more learner-directed ways; of collaborating with museums and using multimedia authoring software as a learning tool.

It was found that the combination of an authentic opportunity for learning outside the school such as a museum visit or field trip followed up with the requirement to create an interactive multimedia presentation to teach others about what you have learned on the trip on your return to class affords the opportunity for students to connect theoretical ideas with experience, to bring together and relate knowledge from different sources in a way that enables the kind of knowledge transformation(s) associated with deep learning.

The project partners’ experiences suggest that the MuseumScouts museum-based, learning by teaching approach:

has educational potential in the context of aims currently articulated by national governments across Europe;
enables productive relationships between schools and museums allowing learners to have access to the rich learning potential of museum collections and the expertise of museum staff;
is flexible enough to be adapted to a variety of contexts;
can facilitate learning of subject knowledge and skill in and understanding of digital technologies and multimedia production;
can positively contribute to teacher training courses.