By: John H. Falk, Lynn D. Dierking, Michael Spock (Foreword by)

Paperback

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What roles can museums serve in a learning community? Why do people go to museums and what do they learn there? The answers to these questions are investigated by combining research and theories from such disparate fields as psychology, neuroscience, education and anthropology, as well as museum studies. The authors explain the nature and process of learning while providing advice on how museums can better create learning environments. Foreword by Michael Spock.

Those interested in visitor studies and informal educational environments will find much to engage them and to think about in this book and I expect to see many quotations from it in student work. -- Paulette McManus, (University College, London) Visitor Studies Today! John Falk and Lynn Dierking ... put to profitable effect their many years of familiarity with the field, including long service at the Smithsonian. This is a splendid book where the pages themselves unequivocally link the concepts of fun and learning. The writing is dense but never dry, didactic but never dogmatic...The book's careful organization makes it easy and pleasant to read, and the key concepts placed succinctly at the end of each chapter enable the hurried and harried professionals to retrieve information without having to remember page numbers. -- Jane Manaster Museline, (Texas Association Of Museums) John Falk and Lynn Dierking have been talking to museum visitors and conducting research on the visiting experience for over twenty years... Learning from Museums ... elaborates topics such as museums and the individual, communities of learners, documenting learning, improving the visitor experience, museums in society, and the future of museums. Visits are both learning and fun, choice of what and when to learn is intrinsic to the museum experience, conversation is a primary mechanism of knowledge construction ... and meaning is elaborated by subsequent experiences... Each chapter finishes with conclusions, key points, and very extensive references: very accessible stuff!... When museums take advantage of visitor research they ... acknowledge the importance of good communication. The message of Learning from Museums must be understood by all concerned with that fundamental aim of museums: the increase and diffusion of understanding. -- Des Griffin, The Australian Museum, Sydney Museum National In Learning from Museums, [the authors] embed practical issues in the broader theoretical and research contexts. With their help we can begin to understand more about what is really going on during the learning process in general, information that can then be applied to the specifics of museums. For once we have a better understanding of how museum visitors make sense of these experiences, then we can make more informed decisions about how to create the best possible exhibitions and programs for them. -- Michael Spock, (University of Chicago) From The Foreword

Foreword	p. vii
Preface	p. ix
Learning from Museums: An Introduction	p. 1
The Personal Context	p. 15
The Sociocultural Context	p. 37
The Physical Context	p. 53
Museums and the Individual	p. 69
Communities of Learners	p. 91
A Place for Learning	p. 113
The Contextual Model of Learning	p. 135
Documenting Learning from Museums	p. 149
Making Museums Better Learning Experiences	p. 177
Museums in the Larger Society	p. 205
The Future of Museums	p. 219
References	p. 237
Index	p. 265
About the Authors	p. 271
Table of Contents provided by Syndetics. All Rights Reserved.

ISBN: 9780742502956
ISBN-10: 0742502953
Series: American Association for State & Local History
Audience: General
Format: Paperback
Language: English
Number Of Pages: 288
Published: 10th May 2000
Dimensions (cm): 23.5 x 15.5  x 1.7
Weight (kg): 0.431