The Smithsonian Institution and the Pearson Foundation are working together to create, develop, and support mobile and digital programming for educators and young people. This Next-Generation Learning Programming is taking place through two distinct Smithsonian Institution sites: the Hirshhorn Museum & Sculpture Garden (HMSG) and the National Postal Museum (NPM).
Beginning in the summer of 2010, educators will visit these two sites to develop individual "next generation learning" approaches, adapting programming provided by the Mobile Learning Institute, the Nokia/Pearson Foundation alliance that brings mobile and digital technologies directly to school classrooms, museums, and libraries.
For Educators: These workshops are designed to provide educators with the opportunity to become familiar with the galleries at these respective museums and to explore how digital and mobile media can be used to enhance their learning experience. Using mobile devices, digital media tools, and social networks to support this process, participants will engage in activities that encourage making meaning and interdisciplinary connections as they discover the exhibits at the Hirshhorn, National Postal Museum, and other sites on the Smithsonian campus. The objective is for teachers to develop their own innovative approaches to interdisciplinary learning and digital media integration which they can share and transfer to their own instructional practice. In addition, these educators will share the results of these next generation learning investigations with local and visiting teaching teams from across the United States.
For Youth: These sessions are designed to provide participating youth with a rich and engaging weeklong summer experience. Working collaboratively in teams, youth attendees will participate in a sequence of activities that includes making thematic connections between the content at two or more Smithsonian museums, creating their own digital gallery of art, artifacts, and objects that reflects the museum’s exhibits from their perspective, and developing mobile theme-based scavenger hunt tours that can be shared with other youth and visitors. Using mobile devices, digital media tools, and social learning networks to support this process, students will engage in activities that encourage making meaning and interdisciplinary connections as they explore the exhibits at the Hirshhorn, National Postal Museum, and other various museums on the Smithsonian campus.
Leadership Summits: The Leadership Summit Series on Digital Media explores and promotes the multiplicity of ways in which digital media are changing the way young people learn, show what they know, and share their ideas – inside and outside the classroom. The Pearson Foundation and the Mobile Learning Institute will be hosting Leadership Summit events at the Smithsonian in June, July, and August for staff and affiliates.
The Educator, Youth, and Leadership Social Networks will serve as the online collaborative space where participants produce, publish, share, and reflect upon the videos, photos, blogs, and lesson plans that they create during the workshop the experience.
