A new report has suggested that children gain confidence and enhanced social skills when schooled in their local museum, with teachers, museums and parents also benefitting.
The report by King’s College London is the result of a four-month study which saw two primary schools and a nursery in the UK moving regular classes to local museums for up to an entire term, with the study designed to explore the concept of co-location.
Starting in February and concluding in June, through the school term, various classes had their day-to-day programme of lessons using the museum’s facilities, offering a fundamentally different experience to the occasional museum visit most school children enjoy.
As part of the innovative scheme, a pre-school nursery for children aged three-to-four was based at Tate Liverpool between 29 February and 11 March. Additionally, a group of children aged nine-to-10 took residence at Arbeia Roman Fort in South Tyneside, while a second group aged four to five moved to the National Waterfront Museum in Swansea on 22 February until the Easter break, with a second group occupying the museum between May and June.
According to the results, an extended museum stay resulted in children becoming more confident and effective communicators, while they also enjoyed memorable learning experiences with the potential for greater learning retention.
Using the museum as a classroom setting, the study also found that the immersion led to to a growing enthusiasm for the opportunities that local cultural organisations can offer, while also helping museums to develop a better understanding of formal education audiences and extended their use of their spaces and collections.
The placement also benefitted teachers, who according to the report became more confident in using out-of-the-classroom resources, in a creative way, to deliver much of the set curriculum. For parents, residencies fostered deeper relationship between them and their children’s school, contributing to greater community cohesion and increased visitation by them to their local museum.
While there were many positives for the study, there were some drawbacks. According to the pilot study there were challenges surrounding understanding between the partners and the logistics of running a school programme in a non-school building.
As a result, King’s College made the recommendation that further museum-based education should include support for extended school residencies in cultural settings, specialist training for teaching in museums, heritage and cultural organisations and the creation of a practical toolkit for organisations interested in cultural residencies.
“The project findings will inspire schools and museums across the UK and contribute to the debate around creative and cultural learning,” said Katherine Bond, director of the Cultural Institute at King’s. “We hope that the pilot projects will lead to new models for the delivery of the national curriculum and that extended school residencies in local museums eventually become part of every child’s education.”
Prior to the pilots, the idea conceived by Wendy James, architect and partner of Garbers & James Architects, was tested in an ‘ideas laboratory’ run by the Cultural Institute.
“As an architect with a background in learning and museums and as a mother of three children, I’ve long felt that the synergy between the two sectors could have benefits for everyone,” said James. “It was wonderful to witness the children’s growing sense of ownership of their local museums and to know that longer term partnerships were formed. I hope that the project can develop and one day come to complete fruition in the establishment of the UK’s first co-located Museum Primary School.”
