Across Europe, exhibitions are used as a common educational practice to enhance learners’ critical thinking, problem solving and reflection. Although visiting exhibitions has positive learning value in a diversity of structures (outdoor, museums, temporary exhibitions, etc) or settings and on a large variety of topics (art, history, sciences, etc), it is by definition a learning process that remains fairly passive as the experience is based on following a path of discovery decided by somebody else, the museum curator. This passive aspect is not optimum as a learning process and creates major differences in the reception and the integration of the learning: some students, often the most successful or the ones with the highest cultural capital, might engage while it is very frequent to lose many others that do not connect by themselves with the exhibition. With the evolution of knowledge and of the population, it becomes obvious that it is essential to provide young people with more meaningful experiences and learning. That is why we are convinced that it possible and useful to make the exhibition an active experience. At the same time, we wish to benefit from the development of technological means such as the multiplication of terminals and publication of classical art work online, to allow learners to be the designers of their own exhibition using digital tools in a meaningful and innovative non-formal approach to learning. The goal of the project is therefore to put the learners truly at the centre of the exhibition development process to maximize their learning and interest through a project-based learning activity: co-curating an exhibition. Indeed, developing and (co)creating an exhibition is a comprehensive process that adds value in young peoples’ learning and personal growth, as it offers real opportunities to acquire and use knowledge to generate ideas and present things in a unique way. Accordingly, VX Designers’ objective is to create a methodology to make the most of exhibitions as a pedagogical tool to develop student’s skills in an inclusive way (specific learning disorders, cultural differences) and to provide teachers and students with the tools to create their own virtual exhibition for learning. Our target is learners who would benefit from learning through the exhibition design and curation experience, and teachers/trainers, whose skills we wish to support and strengthen in order to facilitate this innovative approach to the teaching and learning process. Project partners decided to focus on secondary education students and teachers, and make a positive impact through this project’s activities and results on young people’s skills and key competences needed on the XXIst century market, such as searching for creative solutions, planning and analysing, problem-solving and digital skills. In practice, we intend to reach these results by developing a set of tools that will support teachers in implementing an innovative pedagogy with the use of exhibitions, and provide them with guidance and training material to help them create exhibitions to facilitate their student’s learning and needs. Also, the project has the ambition to equip the teachers, educators and museum professionals with tools and knowledge that will allow them to invite the young members of their audience to the process of creating co-curated exhibitions while developing their technical and ICT skills and encouraging inclusive digital exhibitions creation for practical use tailored to their classrooms’ needs. To do so, VX Designers project will produce the following OER: 1) Exhibition and school guide 2) Exhibition generator Platform 3) User guide for virtual exhibitions creation 4) Pedagogical guide 5) The exhibitions design and their pedagogical sequences All the OER will be developed, tested and adapted during the project. As all OER will target teachers and learners, they will be translated from English into the 4 languages of the partnership (French, Polish, Greek and Spanish). They will also be verified by specialists to ensure that they are as inclusive as possible for learners with specific learning disorders and will be tested in diverse environments and with different social, economic and cultural backgrounds to ensure cultural accessibility and inclusiveness.
VX Designers’ project principal objectives were to: - create a methodology to maximize the potential of exhibitions as a pedagogical tool to develop student’s skills in an inclusive way (specific learning disorders, cultural differences). - to equip the teachers, educators and museum professionals with tools and knowledge that will allow them to invite young people to a process of co-curating exhibitions, while developing their technical and ICT skills and encouraging inclusive digital exhibitions creation for practical use tailored to their classroom with guidance and training material to help them create exhibitions to facilitate their student’s learning. - to foster cultural and museum education in secondary school education and bring closer the European cultural heritage by raising cultural awareness and fostering the intercultural dialogue between teachers, pupils and museum professionals. In addition, the project aimed to support an inclusive approach to learning and address differences in relation to the access and use of underrepresented groups like pupils with diverse cultural backgrounds and students with specific learning disorders.
Exhibitions are typically designed to engage viewers’ critical thinking, problem solving and reflection. In the educational context, they can serve as purposeful teaching strategies to achieve specific learning outcomes and help develop pupils’ skills in communication, research, teamwork, planning and goal setting and technological and online literacy skills. In order to use the maximal pedagogical potential of the museum resources VX Designers project puts students in the center of creation. It aims at reversing the fairly passive experience of exploring the museum assets to a project-based learning process that equips students and teachers in skills which enable them to explore the rich diversity of the cultural heritage in an innovative way. Needs addressed: - lack of resources that would provide project-based learning experience through designing and curating an exhibition - shortage of innovative tools to provide meaningful, pedagogical hands-on experiences for students visiting museums - strengthening cultural awareness and expression as key skills for young people - creating inclusive teaching and learning practices for people with learning disorders - possible improvement of teachers ICT abilities