by Saul Carliner
The summer travel season, when many of us explore new places
and experience new things, is ripe with opportunities for true informal learning—that is, learning where you, as the learner,
set the objectives and determine for yourself when you have achieved them.
(This differs from informal learning for the workplace,
which represents more of a partnership between employers and workers on the
process, content, location, and purpose of learning, and—like other types of
informal learning—can happen consciously or unconsciously. See Chapter 1 of Informal Learning Basics for more about
these definitions.)
Some might learn a new sport. Some might try a new artistic
activity, like journal writing or painting.
Some might try their hand at cooking a different type of cuisine. Some might hike new paths.
And some, like me, might explore new museums. Museums captured my imagination at a young
age, fostered my intellectual awakening, and provided many hours of wonder about—and
engagement with—art, history, science, nature, and even music. More immediate to the point, museums fostered
my interest in informal learning, because that’s what they do.
So how can you get the most from your museum visit—without
killing it? Here are some tips.
Start with a flexible
agenda. From the get-go, give
yourself permission to wander and explore whatever strikes your fancy. This
museum visit isn’t a business meeting where you have specific tasks to
accomplish; it’s supposed to be fun. So
don’t kill it by over-planning it.
Once inside, focus on
what interests you. See something
that catches your attention? Go to
it. Gaze at it. Read about it. Linger all you want, or leave in an instant
if it doesn’t seem to be what you thought it was. You have free choice to explore; that’s why
museums call the type of learning that goes on within their walls free-choice learning.
Follow the efforts to attract your attention. Part of the fun of a museum is the unexpected
discovery and exhibit designers go out of their way to provide you with
opportunities to have one or two of those.
Enticing you to the museum to see a special exhibition, designers
purposely place it in the back of the museum so that you’ll have to walk past
the permanent exhibition—and perhaps, wander into it (much like grocery stores
place the milk at the back to entice you to purchase something else along the
way).
Within exhibits, designers try to beckon visitors to explore
by effectively using sight lines and sizes of objects to catch your
attention. Or they might use sound or
similar audiovisual devices to attract visitors to other parts of the
exhibition or building.
Get a general sense
of what’s going on. Unlike a casino,
where they shut off access to daylight and remove all the clocks so you’ll keep
gambling, museums are not trying to disorient you.
On the contrary, museum design teams want you to know where
you are and what you’re seeing. That’s
why most designers place orientation labels in each gallery so you’ll know the
topic addressed in that gallery and why it’s significant.
When something
interests you a bit, go a bit deeper.
Some galleries strike a chord and motivate visitors to learn more about
the topic. That’s why most museum
exhibition designers—especially in science, history, technology, cultural, and
similar museums—provide a second set of labels, each of which explores a key
theme within the broad topic of the gallery.
These labels usually define the key theme and explain its
relationship to the main topic of the gallery, and provide additional
context. In some exhibitions, thematic
labels highlight some key or signature objects
in the gallery.
If something
interests you a lot, go even deeper than that. In some instances, either because you have an
innate interest in the theme of the exhibition or because the exhibition
designers inspired interest, you want to learn even more—about the broad themes
and about individual objects.
So many museums provide additional labels that go into
further depth about the topic. Section
or case labels describe a sub-theme within a particular theme; object labels
provide details on each object.
When you’re not sure
what to do, get “help.” Most museums
offer guided tours by trained guides, called docents. The tours are usually free, so if you’re not sure where to
begin your visit or what to view while in the building, try this option. Docents are trained to make sure you see key
highlights of the collection on display, but most add a personal story or two
and in the process of doing so, share their infectious enthusiasm for the
museum. So even though you might start a
visit with little interest, the docent might inspire some.
Docent tours also make sense when you face a language
barrier . Most museums display labels in
a limited number of languages. If yours
isn’t one of them, you might miss out on the experience because you can’t get
information about galleries and objects that interest you. Many museums offer
tours in languages other than the ones on display.
But some people still feel uncomfortable with docent
tours. Ask if the museum has a
translation of the exhibition labels.
Some have special books that you can use within the museum; others have
“apps” on the iPad or audioguides (that is, audio devices you can use while in
the museum) that provide information in your language.
And if nothing
interests you, don’t read anything. You
can just look at the objects and appreciate them for what they are—something to
look at. Or just sit on a bench and
observe the other visitors interacting with the exhibition.
That’s the key characteristic of free-choice learning:
you’re free to choose whether or not you feel like learning about something—or
learn about anything at all.
And to be honest, most museums have so many exhibitions and
so many labels that you couldn’t read everything on a single visit if you
wanted to. (That also gives you a reason
to return.)
Continue your
learning. Over the next several
posts, I’ll share some thoughts about museums I’ve recently visited. Maybe that will spark your interest in
visiting one of the ones mentioned—or another one of your choice.
Tip: For more information
about the links between informal learning and museums, see the Introduction and
Chapter 1 of Informal Learning
Basics.
