Vivian Ladd, freelance museum educator
 (802) 223-0395
This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

• First, take a look at the objects. Think about what you see. What objects are most arresting?  What do you notice about them. Think about which objects would be most interesting to children. Think about the associations you make while looking at the objects. Are they historical/contextual?  process-related? Design-related?  Personal? Do the objects provoke an intellectual or emotional response? What do you think you would need to know to fully appreciate them?

• Read printed material about the objects. Read label copy, the related exhibition catalogue, information in the registrars files about the objects. Take notes. Jot down major ideas., i.e. historical/contextual information, important information about the artist’s life, the process used to create the piece, information about what the artist is trying to say.

• Try to crystallize the major ideas about the objects into 4 or 5 categories.

• Walk through the installation. What objects catch your attention? Consider how visitors will move through the show. Think about the way the objects interact with one another. Which objects would you like to spend some time upon? Which can be skipped?

• Outline your traffic pattern. Which objects (rooms) will you need to deal with first? Next?  and so on?

• Consider which objects raise which major ideas. Begin sketching out a logical pattern, not only of objects explored but ideas covered.

• Remember that a good lesson plan of any kind builds. Begin with the concrete and the simple and build in complexity. Allow your audience to learn a fact, relate it to something else, learn another, begin to make comparisons, etc. Try to organize your choice of objects and the knowledge that you impart in logical steps.

• Return to each object and consider how you are going to get your audience to LOOK at it.  Jot down the visual elements of the piece. Think about composition, the way your eye travels through the object, what it represents, what associations it draws to mind, how it was made, etc.

• Do not lecture. You want your audience to discover for themselves what every work of art is trying to communicate. As you think about how to communicate a major idea about an object, restrict yourself to providing a little information, then create some sort of activity.

For instance, consider dealing with process involved with an abstract expressionist painting. You could lecture and describe the evolution of action painting, the artist’s philosophy in adopting this style, and his working methods or you could provide the following information:

This artist wanted you to think about the fact that he painted this work.
He left us lots of clues to follow the steps he took.

Then you might provide the following activity;

Become a detective and see if you can recreate the artist’s steps:
What color did the artist apply first? What came next? And after that?
What kind of a brush did the artist use?  In the background?  For the touches of black?

Activities can range from looking questions to games.  Feel free to read activity sheets from a variety of sources and children’s activity books to get ideas.

• Once you have sketched out some ideas for looking questions and approach imparting the major ideas, begin writing. Start with a very rough draft. You will not be able to fit all your ideas into the five panels of a Family Guide. Since you will have to begin editing early, it is a waste of time to flesh out and refine each of your ideas, only to scrap them due to space constraints.

• Consider how your approach will fit into the space of the Family Guide. Are some sections impossibly long? Are you being repetitive anywhere?  Can you be more concise and efficient?

• Sometimes you will need to provide textual information. However, too much text is overwhelming for a parent with restless children in a room filled with breakables. Try to vary the amount of text and images in the Family Guide so that no one section appears too text heavy.

• Walk through the installation with your rough draft. Do your looking questions help your audience engage with the objects? Is information provided when it is most helpful? Is there a logical sequence to the whole?

• Edit.

• Review the notes from your research. Are you covering all the bases? Does your Family Guide include the most pertinent information? Does it allow families to discover for themselves what is special about the objects they are exploring?

• Edit.
• Walk through the galleries again.  Double check any changes. Check locations, titles, dates, and other information for accuracy.
• Edit.
• Ask a colleague to do the Family Guide in the galleries. Ask for feedback.
• Edit.
• Have the appropriate curator read the Family Guide for accuracy.
• Edit.
• Have a colleague and the editor read the Family Guide for grammatical accuracy.
• Edit.
• Send the Family Guide to the designer.
• Review the overall spacing. Is there a nice variety of text and image? Are cues and direction icons accurately represented?
• Edit.
• Send to printer.
• Enjoy.