There are various resources to assist with advocacy for learning in museums, galleries and historic sites as well as how to plan programmes.

 

Related Organisations

  • Renaissance in the Regions – Arts Council England (ACE)
    ‘Renaissance’ is a programme to transform England’s regional museums now managed by ACE.
  • Arts Council England (ACE) is now responsible for museum strategy and selected funding programmes.
  • Inspiring Learning For All
    Assists you to find out what the people that use your services learn, assess how well you are achieving best practice in supporting learning and improve what you do.
  • Group for Education in Museums (GEM)
    Promotes the importance of learning through museums, galleries and other cultural organisations. They produce the Journal of Education in Museums, which contains practical case studies. It is also worth joining their email list.
  • engage
    engage is a leading international association for gallery educators, artist educators and other arts and education professionals.
  • Culture 24
    This website has news and events, as well as trails and other resources, from 1000s of museums across the country.

 

Books / Reports

  • Buried in the Footnotes: the representation of disabled people in museum and gallery collections, Dodd, Sandell, Delin, Gay (2004),  Leicester: University of Leicester Report (PDF download).
  • Culture on Demand. Ways to engage a broader audience. FreshMinds (DCMS, July 2007).
    A commissioned piece of research on broadening access for different audiences in the arts – useful case studies and good on working with key audiences (people with disabilities, people from lower socio-economic groups and BME audiences). Downloadable from the DCMS website.
  • Learning in the Museum, Hein, George E. (1998), London: Routledge. Classic reader on learning and outlines constructivist approach to exhibition interpretation and learning.
  • The Manual of Museum Learning, Barry Lord (ed.) (AltaMira, 2007).
    Overview of planning learning programmes for a variety of audiences. Useful on interpretation, museum spaces and advocacy.
  • Museum and Gallery Education, Eilean Hooper-Greenhill (Leicester, 1991).
    The classic manual on putting a learning programme together (mainly for schools) and has been updated several times – useful if starting from scratch.
  • Museums and Education: purpose, pedagogy, performance Eilean Hooper-Greenhill (Leicester, 2007).
    An up to date look at learning in museums that draws on new evaluation and planning tools such Inspiring Learning For All.
  • Museums, Prejudice and the Reframing of Difference, Richard Sandell (Routledge, 2006).
    More useful for interpretation but it does look at alternate audiences and ways of understanding collections.
  • Re-presenting disability: activism and agency in the museum, Sandell, R., Dodd, J & Garland-Thomson, Rosemarie (2010), Routledge: Abingdon.
  • Routledge Companion to Museum Ethics, Marstine, Janet C. C. (ed.) (2012), London: Routledge
    Useful case studies and examination of ethics today, including learning programmes and outreach.
  • The Participatory Museum, Simon, Nina (2010). Available online and in printed form, a call to action over active participation interspersed with case studies and examples of good practice in museums.
  • ‘The Participatory Museum’, Stanhope, Nick and Poole, Nick (2012), article available on the Collections Link website. Advocates mass  audience participation, digitisation and collections knowledge as a form increasing access, agency and civic values.

 

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