New museum online learning content strategy - your thoughts please

Update 25 July - I should just add a bit of a disclaimer/explanation here:
1. This thinking isn't related to the work I do in my paid work, more just me rolling ideas around in my head about museum online learning generally
2. This isn't particularly the start of a strategy document, more just some ideas about a modus operandi/working principles (maybe strategy with a small 's'?) for museum online learning.
 
Original post:
I was part of the workshop to critically evaluate the National Musuems Online Learning Project webquests yesterday and as ever, when I step away from my desk, the curtain opened in my brain and I was able to think more broadly then I ever can normally about my job and how I go about it.

Some thoughts developed which I want to expand upon about what a museum online learning strategy should be about and this germ of an idea is brewing in my head that I'd like to hear people's thoughts and comments on.  It's very much a germ of an idea at the moment and I'm sure it has lots of disadvantages so I'd really appreciate your feedback.

What would you think of a museum online learning strategy that set out the following:

1. Online learning resources for schools and colleges that sit on the Museum's website should be in the following forms:

A) A bank of object images with contextual information about them that teachers/tutors/students can download and use for educational use

B) A set of short introductions to the topics that the museum is an authority on

C) A set of short films with schools/colleges as the target audience where a curator talks about particular objects and what you can learn from them

D) A set of relatively light-touch/low-tech pre-visit (and possibly post-visit) resources that support the school/college sessions run by the Museum.  These might be in PPT or SMART notebook or something and would simply serve to introduce key concepts and objects that relate to the session.
In other words the stuff on a museum websites is relatively unprescriptive and is about opening up our 'stuff' and making it available to educators to do what they want with it.

2) All material where the primary aim is to provide a learning experience online that is independent to a face-to-face museum session (and I think this particularly applies to informal learning material online, and to more prescriptive and structured formal learning which does a lot of the teaching for the teacher) e.g. an online game, or an interactive story should do the following :

A) If it is for schools/colleges, pick on particular topic or area of a topic and create a resource to support that area of the curriculum

B) Be developed in partnership with other organisations who have authority on that subject

C) Be developed in partnership with commercial and other big organisations who are already providing this kind of content or where the target audience are already spending time. The idea would be for an equal partnership where funds and resources were put in from both parties

D) Emphasis is put on the findability of the resource from the start

E) Significant budget/resources are set aside for marketing the resource

F) Potentially sit on an independent URL or a place where the target audience are already spending time rather than on the museum's website (Update: 25 July - this is an addition that I meant to put in and realised I'd omitted)

These ideas are based on the following assumptions/observations/thoughts:

• There's no point in museums trying to compete for people's attention and leisure time with online activities which are much better funded than museums are ever likely to be.
• People will only come to museum websites either if they know that there is material there or if they find it by accident in Google.
• We have limited resources both in terms of budget and staff time and it's vital that we channel our energies wisely.

Please please feel free to use the comments to let me know what you think. I'd really value some discussion on this and so I hope it gets people thinking and chatting. Over to you!

Ross Parry's recommendation to proceed

My dissertation pack arrived today, complete with instructions and guidelines on writing my dissertation, and, most importantly, a detailed response to my proposal by Ross Parry. This concluded, crucially, with the very welcome sentence 'I recommend the applicant and this project for Masters research' - phew!

Ross described my proposed subject as 'a timely and potentially important piece of reserach into how museums might use wikis'. He noted that 'there is potential for genuine innovation within this project' - which was very encouraging!

He feels that my decision to focus on Wikis as a specific aspect of Web 2.0, and The British Postal Museum & Archive's (BPMA)'s Wiki specially as a good one as it limits the topic and stops it from becoming unmanageable.

Ross suggests that during my preliminary reading around the subject, I should seek to refine my research questions into one single, challenging question. As an example, (but not suggesting I should necessarily use this one) he puts forward 'Can Wikis really work for museums? The practical, technical and conceptual challenges of Web 2.0 technology for the BPMA'.

In addition he advised me to 'marshal more systematically [the] key ideas and themes.' e.g. the practical, conceptual and technical themes in the example title.

As recommended reading, Ross has suggested the online proceedings of the 'Museums and the Web' conferences, especially those of the last few years.

In terms of data gathering, Ross thinks that I need to get a clear idea pretty quickly of what I'm trying to achieve with the project as this will affect whether or not, and how much I need to gather user evaluation data etc.

Luckily Ross didn't foresee there being any ethical risks to my project (which is why I got my proposal back earlier than some people I think). He in facts suggests that I could even consider looking into the ethics of wikis (specifically user-generated content).

So there we are, permission to start on the project that will no doubt dominate much of my waking (and perhaps some of my sleeping) life for the next six months. I'm taking a week off from my MA this week. I'm still recovering from the final essay and I need some time to clean my flat, do some washing, and turn my head around! I expect I might do the odd bit of reading here and there but mostly I'm having a rest.

I'm actually quite excited about starting this project though. Unlike the prescribed essays all the way through the MA, it's a subject that I've been able to choose myself, and can shape into whatever I want to make it. It's a topic I'm becoming increasingly interested in and I feel quite fired by it. Whether or not I still feel like that by the end of August will be another question - if you're interested in finding out then keep reading! :-)

Next week I'll start doing some reading. I hope to comment on and summarise it as I go along on here.

Starting my dissertation on Museum Wikis

I have submitted a dissertation proposal for the final stage of my MA in Museum Studies by Distance Learning. It's going to be broadly about museum wikis. For those of you that don't know, a Wiki is defined on Sandy Berger's Techionary as 'From a Hawaiian word that means "quick", a wiki is a website that can be edited quickly by Web visitors'. At The British Postal Museum & Archive (BPMA) where I work, we've just launched a new Wiki which I am in charge of. This puts me in quite a strong position to talk about the practical issues that face museums wanting to use Wiki technology.

I had discussed this with my personal tutor and as a result submitted a proposal based around comparing a Museum Wiki experience with a real-world museum experience, and discussing issues about authority etc. I had identified certain key research questions:

• Is interactivity and web 2.0 technology the future for the process of meaning-making and storytelling in museums?
• Can wiki technology help audiences learn and engage with a museum and its website by getting them actively involved in creating content?
• In a broader context, how does interactivity in museums benefit visitors?
• How are wikis and other Web 2.0 technologies changing the face of modern museums?
• Does interactivity have implications for the ‘authoritative’ nature of the museum?
• Is this wider cultural context of audience participation really what audiences want?

These were quite general questions and had strayed slightly from my original conception of a dissertation basically about the BPMA Wiki.

An encouraging conversation with Ross Parry on the phone last week in fact confirmed that I could do just that. It was great to discuss some ideas with Ross and hear his enthusiasm about our Wiki and my dissertation proposal.

He suggested that I treat it as a story of how the BPMA have got to the position we are currently at with the Wiki and the issues that have arisen. He suggestedI start by taking stock of web 2.0 in general and the stage it is at. I could then write about 2,000 words specifically about Wikis generally both inside and outside the museum and heritage sector. Following on from this, he thought I could talk about the constraints and pressures that face museums wanting to work with Wikis and how Wikis work with museological ambition. This might encompass issues like authority, content and digital assets.

The next chapter could then say 'ok, if a museum wanted to build one of these Wikis, how would they do so? Why might they do so? What rules would they need to apply? What precedents are there. This would bring in the practical examples of the BPMA Wiki and the issues that we have tackled and are tackling.

I'm waiting now for Ross's official write up on my proposal and now I'm itching to get started. I've just got to finish my final essay this weekend and then I can really get my teeth into it. I'm starting to build up a bookmark list of all the articles out there that I want to read - there are so many of them! I'm also starting to keep an eye on key blogs that seem to regularly comment on Museums and the Web, particularly Web 2.0 and Wikis.

The ones I am currently looking at are:

Frankie Roberto's blog
Open Objects
Foe Romeo

and a few others. I'd be interested to know of any others I should be keeping an eye on.

The next stage will be receiving Ross's comments and official sanction to begin my research. I'm on tenterhooks now until that arrives! Watch this space!