Adult Education In The Art Museum PDF Download

This study is concerned with art museum visitor engagement, specifically adult visitors. Improving visitor experience has long been a topic of interest for museum education professionals. With this project, I explore the potential of an educational tool of my own creation, and investigate the ways in which the social aspects of visiting a museum can contribute to a meaningful experience. Focusing on these two avenues of investigation, I seek to answer the following questions: How can an educational resource such as a non-digital guidebook support museum educators in helping adult learners enhance their museum experience and develop new perspectives? What perceptions of art and visiting art museums do non-expert adult learners have? How do the participants describe the value of the learning community coordinated to support interpersonal learning during their visit? Using Arts-Based methods, I developed a guidebook filled with gallery activities that promote a multimodal approach, discussion prompts, and illustrations for navigating the Art Institute of Chicago. Then, after recruiting a small group of willing participants who fit the definition of non-expert adult learners, I coordinated three group visits to the Art Institute of Chicago over a period of three months. Before our first visit, participants completed an informal questionnaire about their perceptions of art museums. Each group visit took place in a different area of the museum and involved a combination of gallery discussions, mini tours, and activities from the guidebook. To gather data I recorded guidebook entries and reflections after each visit, invited a colleague to observe group interactions, and maintained follow-up correspondence with each participant. During this Action-Based research project, I found that recruiting in "sets" made participants more likely to attend and more likely to interact in group discussions. I also was surprised to discover that participants were more responsive to my gallery facilitation than to "free time" with the guidebook. The guidebook turned out to be extremely helpful in structuring the content for group visits. Overall I was impressed by how quickly new social connections were established and maintained, and how much my own experience as a facilitator was enriched as a result. These conclusions underscore just how effective an element of sociability can be for meaningful museum experiences.