My last post, on the role of education research in planning museum programs, sparked debate in person and on LinkedIn about whether museums emphasize content knowledge or an understanding of pedagogy when hiring, training, and supporting museum education staff. For better or worse, it’s essential that museum educators know both. They need to understand the content they are…
Recently, I have been thinking about the role of research in museum education work thanks to the podcast Sold a Story. This podcast shares the rise and fall of Reading Recovery, a popular reading program in elementary schools. Reading Recovery took schools by storm in the 1980s, but it is based on ideas that have…
Over the past few months, numerous experiences have been driving me toward the question: What do museum educators need to know? First, in February I attended a MuseumExpert webinar during which Martin Storksdiek discussed an attempt by ASTC and NSF to identify “the skills, knowledge, values, and other capabilities that enable [an informal science educator]…
Museum Questions 