Dear Friends:

Perhapes I was too strong in my opinion on Children's museums, however it has
been my experience that they hardly live up to their expectations.  How many
"museums" have a play tower, water play or that plastic ball land?  They have
become generic.  One of the assignments I give my students in the Graduate
program I teach in is to go to such a place and observe how the children
play, interact, and learn.  We also interview the professional staff about
their jobs.  We find some very remarkable things, generally very unpleasent.
The executive Director of one such museum told me a very interesting thing
one time.  They said,  "  We were doing average until we discovered that you
market a children's museum to adults not to children."  "It plays off their
guilt"  "It does not really matter if the kids are learning anything only
that the parents think that this is quality time, after all the parents have
the money."   When educational institutions start chasing dollars and not
quality education we all suffer.

Brian

=========================================================
Important Subscriber Information:

The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://museums.state.nm.us/nmmnh/museum-l.html. You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes).

If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to
[log in to unmask] The body of the message should read "Signoff
Museum-L" (without the quotes).