Preface Acknowledgements Contents 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 URLs References
Museums, Organizations *
INFORMAL EDUCATION *
MUSEUM SITES *
Metropolitan Museum of Art *
Exploratorium *
The Stuhr Museum of the Prairie Pioneer *
Museums of Paris *
ORGANIZATION SITES *
National Audubon Society *
American Chemical Society *
The American Chemical Society's ChemCenter Web site. *
American Academy for Asthma, Allergy, and Immunology *
TUTORIALS *
REFERENCES *
URLs *
Today nearly every group or organization seems to have a Web site. For museums and for organizations with special purposes such as the National Arbor Day Foundation or the Audobon Society, a Web site can play a variety of important roles.
The term museum implies the existence of a collection, usually an organized collection. It implies that at least part of the collection will be available for access, either public, academic, or some other designated access. A major question that any museum can ask itself relates to how much of its information should be displayed on the Web. For a children's museum, where the collection may consist entirely of constructed exhibits or things not widely regarded as collectable, putting information on the Web is low risk. For an art museum, this may be an entirely different matter. Most museums depend upon revenue streams that relate to attendance, and whatever is made public puts attendance at potential risk.
For the present, at least, museums appear to favor making their collections available for some use on the Web. The experiences of visiting a museum on the Web is very different from visiting it live are very different. The Melbourne Museum {U13.01}, perhaps the first major new museum to open its door in this millennium, has been planned from the outset to have a major technological outreach program. Milekic addressed the issue of making digital information in virtual museums child friendly {U13.02}.
Museums certainly are interested in using the Web. An annual conference, Museums and the Web {U13.03}, seems to be thriving. Early graduates of the UNL Museum Studies program have been rewarded by employers for any training they received in Web use. Reports are emerging regarding the use of museum sites by "virtual visitors" [Johnson, 2000].
There's a big difference between a Web site for a teacher in a course, and a museum. For a teacher, the students may have to come to the site for information. So, the site need not be especially efficient or attractive. For a museum, it is likely that return visits and word-of-mouth referrals will happen only if the site is both attractive and efficient.
Education that takes place outside of school settings, especially that connected with museums and organizations, is called informal education. A vital statistic for any museum is the amount of time visitors spend at an exhibit. Thirty seconds is a typical exhibit interaction time.
All museums open to the public, whether or not accessed by a fee, depend upon attendance for much of their funding. Neither agencies nor benefactors are likely to lavish resources upon a museum that no one visits. A major question for a museum, therefore, is how much of its collection should it display at a Web site? This question remains largely unanswered as of this writing.
On the other hand, museum visitors with a focused visit strategy show greater learning from their visits than do casual visitors [Falk et al., 1998]. It is clear that effective use of a Web site could help a visitor focus a museum visit. While the net impact of having an extensive Web site upon the total number of visitors is uncertain, such a site can enhance the impact of a visit. And such a Web site certainly allows people all over the world to have the pleasure of being a virtual visitor.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York) {U13.04} has a very attractive, extensive site. When you first access the site, you are engaged by something related to current exhibits as in Figure 13.01. This page changes daily. Visitors to this virtual museum must click further to reach a menu-oriented screen.
Figure 13.01. Partial opening screen of a Web visit to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, on Sunday. March 4, 2000. Copyright © 2000 The Metropolitan Museum of Art. All rights reserved. With permission.
Figure 13.02. Menu-like Web screen from a Web visit to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, on Sunday. March 4, 2000. Copyright © 2000 The Metropolitan Museum of Art. All rights reserved. With permission.
A large portion of the Met's collection is presented elegantly at this Web site. There is an extensive, attractive Web store. Museum memberships are offered, and with Met membership comes Museum store discounts. There are significant educational resources. The teacher resources are more local than national; they appear intended to support visits to the museum.
The Exploratorium (San Francisco, CA) {U13.05} is a premier science museum known worldwide for its interactive exhibits. The Exploratorium's Web site contains schedules, exhibits, live broadcasts, links to other sites, membership information, and an online store.
The Exploratorium Web site features clever, well-thought-out, interactive exhibits. Links to other sites are maintained. There is a Web store, and memberships are sold online.
Figure 13.03. A Web visit to the Exploratorium. This site includes online, interactive exhibits. Reproduced with permission. ©Exploratorium ®, www.exploratorium.edu
Figure 13.04. A Web visit to the Exploratorium. The fading dot exhibit. {U13.06} ©Exploratorium®, www.exploratorium.edu
The Stuhr Museum of the Prairie Pioneer (Grand Island, Nebraska) {U13.07} is devoted to early life in the Plains States, especially Nebraska. It has a Web site which affords many of the same features as the larger museums, but much less is automated and online. The education program described at the site specifies activities by grade level, K-6.
Figure 13.05. The Web site for the Stuhr Museum of the Prairie Pioneer contains many of the features found at larger sites. As of this writing, the site was less systematic in its commercial activities (sales, memberships) than were those of the larger museums. With permission.
Sometimes information from several museums is gathered together in a single Web site. The site for art museums in Paris, France, is very useful.
Figure 13.06. The Web site for Museums of Paris {U13.08}. With permission.
Special purpose organizations have a great deal to gain and little to lose from developing Web sites. A Web site can extend the reach of their message at very low cost. It can be an effective fundraiser. It can support educational programming. Modern politicians have supported and embraced the use of the Internet. Clearly, Web sites played an important role in some national campaigns of 2000. The role of Web sites is quickly growing for a wide variety of organizations. The URLs of non-profit organizations are usually identified with the ".org" designation.
The National Audubon Society {U13.09} has a fairly comprehensive site. The national site links to information on topics of interest to members, membership information, the chapter sites, and a store. The National Audobon Society has a policy that all of its various chapters serve from the same Web server.
Networking between persons of like interests has been facilitated enormously by the Web. One link available from the Audubon site is a signup for the Classroom Feeder Watch {U13.10}, a research program supported through the Cornell University Laboratory of Ornithology.{U13.11} Through this particular project, researchers attempt to involve self-identified classrooms as observers.
Figure 13.07. The Audubon Society Web site. With permission.
Figure 13.08. The Classroom Feeder Watch program, accessed from the National Audubon Web site. This is an example of how the Web extends a community of interested learners, and makes them more active as participants. With permission.
The American Chemical Society {U13.12} maintains an extensive Web site. Most of the services available from this site require membership or must be purchased. The library of online journals may be searched for topics, and abstracts are available online free of charge.
Figure 13.09. The American Chemical SocietyŐs ChemCenter Web site. With permission.
Professional organizations of all sorts also maintain Web sites. For example, see the American Academy for Asthma, Allergy, and Immunology site {U13.13}. This professional organizationŐs Web site is rich with information about the diseases treated by the organizationŐs members. As such, it is a valuable resource for students and teachers. At the same time, the site provides significant services for members. By entering a Zip code, users can retrieve lists of physicians specializing in the treatment of allergies and immunological deficiencies.
Figure 13.10. The American Academy for Asthma, Allergy, and Immunology Web site. With permission.
In addition to commercial and educational tutorials, there are informal sources of short tutorials or courses online at Web sites like SmartPlanet.com {U13.14}. This site offers courses contributed by members or organizations in eight different major topics. Some of the courses require a fee to participate while others are free. Courses are offered in two different formats: self-study and instructor led. Courses are at three levels of expense: free, standard, and premium. Participation in courses requires signing up for free membership; for a monthly fee, a "Standard" membership includes registration in both the free and standard courses.
While many Web materials look and feel as if designed for particular courses, the Web is rich with general information. It is like a worldwide public library. Where better to go to learn about this library than a library? {U13.15} (Figure 13.11).
Figure 13.11. U. C. BerkeleyŐs tutorial for finding information on the Internet.
Falk, J. H., Moussouri, T., & Coulson, D. (1998). The effect of visitorsŐ agendas on museum learning. Curator, 41,107-120.
Johnson, N. B. (2000). Tracking the virtual visitor: A report from the National Gallery of Art. Museum News, March/April, p. 42.
U13.01. Melbourne Museum, http://melbourne.museum.vic.gov.au/ (accessed 5/14/00).
U13.02. Child-friendly Digital Museums, http://helios.hampshire.edu/~smCCS/ museum_web.htm (accessed 5/15/00).
U13.03. Museums and the Web (annual conference), http://www.archimuse.com/mw99/index.html (accessed 4/2/00).
U13.04. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, http://www.metmuseum.org (accessed 4/2/00).
U13.05. Exploratorium, http://www.exploratorium.edu/ (accessed 5/23/00).
U13.06. Exploratorium: Fading Dot, http://www.exploratorium.edu/exhibits/ fading_dot/fading_dot.html (accessed 4/2/00).
U13.07. The Stuhr Museum of the Prairie Pioneer, http://www.stuhrmuseum.org/ (accessed 4/2/00).
U13.08. Museums of Paris, http://www.paris.org/Musees/mus.alpha/P.f.html (accessed 4/2/00).
U13.09. National Audobon Society, http://www.audobon.org/ (accessed 4/2/00).
U13.10. Classroom Feeder Watch, http://birdsource.tc.cornell.edu/cfw/ (accessed 4/2/00).
U13.11. Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology, http://birds.cornell.edu/ (accessed 5/23/00).
U13.12. American Chemical Society, http://www.chemcenter.org/ (accessed 4/2/00).
U13.13. American Academy for Asthma, Allergy, and Immunology, http://www.aaaai.org/ (accessed 4/2/00).
U13.14. Smart Planet, http://www.smartplanet.com/sphome.asp (accessed 6/17/00).
U13.15. Finding Information on the Internet: A TUTORIAL, http://www.lib. berkeley.edu/TeachingLib/Guides/Internet/FindInfo.html (accessed 6/17/00).