This article outlines the changes, developments, activities, and challenges faced by Hungarian museums over the last few decades. It shows that there was life behind the "Iron Curtain," with museums enjoying relative financial stability. While the political and economic changes associated with the transition from a communist to a democratically…

This essay examines the educational practices at the Moderna galerija, a national museum of modern and contemporary art in Ljubljana, Slovenia, in the last twenty years. Its aim is to reflect on the museum education in relation to broader historical context, of the former Yugoslavia (the country Slovenia was a part of until 1991) and discuss how…

This article describes and analyzes a cross-border, "simultaneous exhibition" collaborative project in six post-conflict western Balkan countries. Through a process of collaboration, active learning, and audience development, professional and personal trust developed among eleven museums. Previously identified barriers were overcome and…

The story of the Center for Digital Art in Holon is a story of innovation in the face of adversity. At key points of escalation in the Middle East conflict, this small-scale arts center managed to rise above and beyond the larger and more traditional museums in Israel to create new models for arts engagement. This article will present the critical…

Often considered places of solemn contemplation, quiet inspiration and personal reflection, art museums seem among the most reluctant to embrace early childhood audiences. Melina Mallos discusses action research at the Queensland Art Gallery [vertical bar] Gallery of Modern Art, Australia, as a means of gaining new insight into children's learning…

Created at the dawn of the social networking era, the International Museum of Women (IMOW) is an online museum that has consistently harnessed online technology in the service of its mission. Recognizing that online technology is evolving and ever changing, the museum must be flexible, adapting delivery of its content to the tools available at…

In these difficult financial times, it is more important than ever to manage money carefully. Educators who don't do so are vulnerable, for despite a thirty-year history of increasing authority and status within and without the museum, education departments are still more expendable than curatorial or collections departments in some museums. This…

The Australian Museum has been working with the Coalition of Knowledge Building Schools over the past five years. Students aged from 5-18 years have been advising the Museum on the development of exhibitions and programs, as well as how the Museum can best use the digital environment to showcase its research and collections. This paper outlines…

The article describes and discusses the use of focus groups and questionnaires to evaluate educational printed material for high school level art teachers prior to publication. The material consisted of "The Notebook of the Investigative Teacher," created by the Instituto Itau Cultural to help teachers develop critical skills in discussing…

Frontline museum floor staff people are critical agents in the field's efforts to catalyze greater community engagement and participation at the intersections of science, art, history, and society. Yet, coming from widely disparate backgrounds and often with little formal professional development in place, many museum-based education practices are…

In this paper we present a way to study science learning on a discursive level in a teaching activity designed for a museum of natural history. We used here an analysis of practical epistemologies. The method, which allows a description of students' meaning making in socially shared practices, has been used previously to analyze learning in…

What meaning visitors make from their interactions with science center exhibits--and "how" they do so--is an issue of enduring interest in the field of learning in informal contexts. In order to explore what resources schoolchildren bring to bear in making meaning, this study used video clips taken during school trips to prompt reflection in…

This article offers findings from a learning sciences-informed evaluation of a nanoscience and nanotechnology exhibition called Nano-Aventura (NanoAdventure), based on four interactive-collaborative games and two narrated videos. This traveling exhibition was developed in Brazil by the Museu Exploratorio de Ciencias for children and teenagers…

For this author, the in-depth conversation about Comprehensive Interpretive Plans (CIP) began at an AAM Task Force meeting in May of 2004. Building on that initial discussion, the author explores the reasons, costs and benefits of engaging in the CIP development process, and makes the case for the museum field to develop proficiency in this…

This paper looks at how two art museums are striving to create relevant, dialogic gallery spaces where broader audiences can make meaning. Using the writings of theorist bell hooks as the framework, it proposes museum educators' experiences working from the margins of their museums' hierarchical organizations is fundamental to their work in…