skip to main content
US FlagAn official website of the United States government
dot gov icon
Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.
https lock icon
Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock ( lock ) or https:// means you've safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Explore Research Products in the PAR
It may take a few hours for recently added research products to appear in PAR search results.


Title: Co-Construction of Iteration Through Failure Moments: Interactions Between Museum Educators and Visitors
Museum educators play a major role in how visitors’ experience failure moments during STEM-related activities. The purpose of this study was to explore how museum educators co-constructed iteration through failure moments with visitors during an engineering activity. Utilizing an instrumental case study, we analyzed video data and one-on-one reflective meetings from five museum educators. Through our analysis, we highlight how educators and visitors are able to jointly attend, interpret, and respond to failures that leads to continuous improvements of the prototype and/or design process (i.e., iteration). The significance of this study lies in providing informal educators with approaches they can incorporate to support visitors during the failure-learning process, namely, strategies that develop visitors’ noticing skills around failure.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
2005927
PAR ID:
10559205
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ; ;
Publisher / Repository:
Visitor Studies Association
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Visitor Studies
Volume:
27
Issue:
2
ISSN:
1064-5578
Page Range / eLocation ID:
184 to 206
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
More Like this
  1. ; ; ; ; (, British Journal of Educational Psychology)
    Abstract BackgroundIn this paper, we add to the scant literature base on learning from failures with a particular focus on understanding educators' shifting mindset in making‐centred learning environments. AimsThe aim of Study 1 was to explore educators' beliefs about failure for learning and instructional practices within their local making‐centred learning environments. The aim of Study 2 was to examine how participation in a video‐based professional development cycle regarding failure moments in making‐centred learning environments might have shifted museum educators' failure pedagogical mindsets. SampleIn Study 1, the sample included 15 educators at either a middle school or museum. In Study 2, the sample included 39 educators across six museums. MethodsIn Study 1, educators engaged in a semi‐structured interview that lasted between 45 and 75 min. In Study 2, the six museums video recorded professional development sessions. ResultsResults from Study 1 highlighted educators' failure pedagogical mindsets as either underdeveloped or rigid and absent of relational thinking between self‐ and youth‐failures. One key result from Study 2 was a shift from an abstract sense of failure as youth‐focused to a practical sense of failure as educator‐focused and/or relational (i.e., youth educator‐focused failure moments). ConclusionsBased on the results from Study 1 and Study 2, our research suggests that exploring an educator's relationship with failure is important and witnessing and reflecting upon their own failure pedagogical mindset in action may facilitate a shift towards a more complex and interconnected space for growth and development of both educators and youth. 
    more » « less
  2. ; ; ; (, Curator: The Museum Journal)
    Museums offer a unique role and safe space in shaping how youth view and react to experiences with failure. The purpose of this study was to add to the conversation around failure in out‐of‐school learning, particularly from the perspective of educators within museum settings that implement STEAM‐related making exhibits, workshops, and/or camps for youth. We analyzed approximately 9 h of video data from two sources: video recordings of virtual group meetings with 14 museum educators from six partnering institutions, and video recordings from five of the individual partnering sites discussing failure as a concept within their organization and programming. In this article, we demonstrate how the framings of failure by museum educators are bounded, and transformed, by un/seen external forces that ultimately impact the professional practices of educators in their organizations. We contend that the significance of this study lies in how perspectives around failure are produced and how they influence educators' professional practice, specifically in how failure is framed and communicated within STEAM‐related learning opportunities in museum settings. 
    more » « less
  3. ; ; ; ; ; (, CHI '19 Proceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems)
    Immersive open-ended museum exhibits promote ludic engagement and can be a powerful draw for visitors, but these qualities may also make learning more challenging. We describe our efforts to help visitors engage more deeply with an interactive exhibit's content by giving them access to visualizations of data skimmed from their use of the exhibit. We report on the motivations and challenges in designing this reflective tool, which positions visitors as a "human in the loop" to understand and manage their engagement with the exhibit. We used an iterative design process and qualitative methods to explore how and if visitors could (1) access and (2) comprehend the data visualizations, (3) reflect on their prior engagement with the exhibit, (4)plan their future engagement with the exhibit, and (5) act on their plans. We further discuss the essential design challenges and the opportunities made possible for visitors through data-driven reflection tools. 
    more » « less
  4. ; ; ; ; ; (, Curator: The Museum Journal)
    Abstract We have been learning about the learning of children and youth, teachers, and visitors over the course of 7 years as we developed and deepened a research agenda in education in our natural history museum. In 2016 in this journal, we detailed how we began this effort and the development and initial steps of an educational research agenda. Focusing on our work since then, our team of educational researchers describes how our research has revealed the considerable impact of out‐of‐school learning with youth, educators, and visitors and how we incorporate a focus upon equity across all areas of inquiry. We share main findings emerging from our research, early roadblocks and current challenges, and lessons about engaging in research on learning in a cultural institution with implications for both large and small settings. 
    more » « less
  5. ; ; ; ; ; ; ; (, Visitor Studies)
    The museum field has begun exploring the effects of facilitation on visitors’ learning, focusing on facilitation by museum staff inside museum buildings. However, some museum professionals contend that museums have a responsibility to serve their communities in the spaces where community members spend time, rather than expecting the public to come to them. Less is known about the effects of facilitation on visitors in urban outdoor spaces where interactions with facilitators are unexpected. The present study contributes to this line of literature by describing a quasi-experimental study that assessed the effects of exhibition facilitation led by community stewards using a trauma-informed approach in an outdoor, freely accessible civic plaza. Video observation and visitor interview data were collected. The present study found that facilitation increased visitors’ exhibit usage, overall satisfaction, and some but not all assessed areas of affective and metacognitive learning. The study highlights the value of research conducted in partnership and the power of content-humanizing facilitation. 
    more » « less
  • Citation Formats
  • MLA
  • APA
  • Chicago
  • BibTeX
  • Save / Share this Record
  • Send to Email