Museums come in many forms, but each presents endless opportunity for learning and discovering. When visiting a museum, students often do not realize the amount of work put into an exhibition. From the early stages of researching an artist to the installment of the show, there are many steps taken before the exhibition opens.

"Museology" introduces students to the museum as a learning resource. Museums are a primary source that children can use to make connections in a nonlinear interdisciplinary fashion. Sixth grade students from PS 144 were given the opportunity to investigate the infrastructure of the Queens Museum of Art and discover how to plan and install a major exhibition. Behind the scenes, they met the Executive Director, curators, public relations staff, exhibit installers, educators, and security personnel.

After their visit, students helped design their own museum exhibit, Call and Response, using artwork they created in response to their own visits to the Museum. In addition to their own show, they became Junior Educators for a day.

Here are some questions for you to ask your own class after visiting a museum:

• How is learning in a museum different from learning in the classroom? Is it different from learning with a textbook?
• How is visiting a museum like surfing the Internet?
• How do museums convey information to their audience? Is this similar to the way you write?
• Does the museum have a bias or a point of view?
• Do the exhibits reflect the curator's point of view?
• How does the museum represent the community?

For more information, try these books:

Gartenhaus, Alan Reid. Minds in Motion: Using Museums to Expand Creative Thinking. Caddo Gap Press, 1997.

Richardson, Joy. Inside the Museum: A Children's Guide to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1993.