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COMMUNITY:
Project Descriptions

Partnership of Playful Learners

July 1, 2005 - June 30, 2009 | Public Programs, Exhibitions

The Chicago Children's Museum (CCM) will develop CityScape, a 2,500 sq ft permanent exhibition based on design strategies for researching and promoting adult-child collaborative learning. INTELLECTUAL MERIT: This project will develop and test culturally-sensitive exhibit and program design approaches for increasing adult involvement in children's learning; explore the potential of visual documentation of learning through play to make children's progress more visible as well as build caregiver confidence and skills; and demonstrate exhibition design as an experimental platform for a museum-learning researcher partnership. Project partners include the Chicago Metropolitan YMCA, Dept. of Psychology at Northeastern Illinois University and the Erikson Institute of Chicago. BROADER IMPACTS: The exhibition and accompanying materials have the potential to serve 1.8 million people over three years. In addition, CCM also will create a partnership of 20 museums and science centers based on parent involvement in children's museum experiences. The Informal Science Education field will be advanced through exploration of this model for integrating exhibition and program development with basic and applied educational research, accompanied by the application of visual documentation.

Funders

NSF
Funding Program: ISE/AISL
Award Number: 0452550
Funding Amount: 1691180

TEAM MEMBERS

  • REVISE logo
    Principal Investigator
    Chicago Children's Museum
  • Jennifer Farrington
    Co-Principal Investigator
    Chicago Children's Museum
  • Louise Belmont-Skinner
    Co-Principal Investigator
    Chicago Children's Museum
  • Rick Garmon
    Project Manager
    Chicago Children's Museum
  • Justine Roberts
    Project Manager
    Gyroscope, Inc.
  • Ron Davis
    Contributor
    Gyroscope, Inc.
  • Discipline: Education and learning science | Engineering
    Audience: Elementary School Children (6-10) | Middle School Children (11-13) | Parents/Caregivers | Museum/ISE Professionals | Evaluators
    Environment Type: Public Programs | Museum and Science Center Programs | Exhibitions | Museum and Science Center Exhibits

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