Hello,

Regarding Laura Dell's request for information about museums providing
educational programming for schools via video-conferencing equipment, we've
been experimenting with these programs since last November.

I work at the Royal BC Museum in Victoria, Canada, and along with the BC
Ministry of Education and Sony Canada through Matrix Professional Video Systems
Inc in Vancouver, we have provided electronic field trips to students from five
different classes throughout British Columbia and three classes in Manitoba.

Students prepared for these field trips through a discovery kit and information
package that we sent to the teachers beforehand. Then, two student hosts, along
with two of our own program producers toured our blockbuster temporary exhibit,
Leonardo da Vinci: Scientist, Inventor, Artist. Students from these classes
could ask questions and direct the cameras to areas of interest. One class of
grade five students from Lumby, BC were assigned a post-tour exercise related
to what they had explored in the Leonardo exhibit. They scouted through their
community for examples of machines that used gears, developed simple machines
of their own, developed a presentation, and then showed their results to staff
at the RBCM using the video-conferencing equipment. Their presentations were
terrific, and demonstrated to us the value of actively engaging the students in
the program.

These were very successful pilot programs. We feel they have a strong potential
for institutions like ours to reach out to a much broader audience. We are now
looking at producing a business case to develop this into a regular part of our
educational programming.

Bernice Neal
Program Production
Royal British Columbia Museum
[log in to unmask]
ph: (250)387-6457

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