This document describes a school-museum-university collaborative model for the effective use of museum resources to develop scientific observation and thinking skills in minority children. Participants in the program were 268 Hispanic American fourth-graders, most of whom were from low socioeconomic backgrounds. Over a 12-week period the students, accompanied by student teachers, toured a museum science exhibit, had four classroom lessons related to the visit administered once a week, and in the 10th or 11th week revisited the museum exhibit. A pretest and tests given after each museum visit assessed children's thinking, observation, and inference abilities; the study also examined the project's influence on the student teachers' questioning skills. In order to test the influence of the time factor, a control group of 57 students of comparable background was given a 2-week intensive experience of the same program. Although great variability was found among test items, the control group's apparent growth in thinking skills argues that an intensive timeframe may be critical for science process learning. Overall, it was believed that the program and lessons had significantly improved students' skills and aided the preservice teachers in developing questioning skills to help guide the students' learning. (CB)