I’m still waiting for this hall to open up again. I loved the locos on display in there and I’d love to go inside the carriages. Please don’t alter the interior of the station hall though; I love the way it looks.
Wow...amazing activity and so smart, wish I knew this before. I am very excited to try this activity out :) really gets the pupils/students to understand how scientists and science work...
You keep on focusing on museums and do not include hackerspaces, makerspaces, biohackerspaces, innovation labs, hubs, etc etc... people go to museus to see things, rarely you find one nicely interactive, and if you are luck, you have a hands-on experience with something contextualized. Try to include more possibilities and you will see Paulo Freire´s ideas moving fast inside the maker/biohacking communities. It is all about freedom and critical thinking with a social way of thinking. That is mostly it. Makers, hackers, designers e loads of other people working in strong citizen science are moving to that direction. :)
First of all, thank you so much for commenting and giving us something to think about! We agree with you that museums are only one part of the wider learning landscape - zoos and festivals were name-checked in the animation amongst others - but you are right to point out that hackerspaces, makerspaces, innovation labs, creative STEM hubs and so on are equally important in helping to support the building of a person’s science capital. We recognise that people experience and learn science in many different ways - at home, at school, in everyday life - and that hands-on with minds-on learning can be motivating, along with making that learning personal. The informal science sector, which includes all of the above, has the potential to positively influence people’s attitudes to science and broaden people’s ideas about what counts as science. We know how valuable bringing in makers, hackers, designers, artists can be in really get people thinking creatively about science; and demonstrating that there are diverse people who work in or benefit from science. We continue to learn in this space. (When we talk about science we mean science, technology, engineering and maths).
Hi, thanks. I really like the idea of science capital (and it should be broad in its way of approaching how people learn about, engage and contribute to science), and I think you made balanced points above regarding my comments. Thank you for the great work! I would just point out that many makerspaces and hackerspaces do research, and not only trial-and-error and hands-on, and I think you pointed that out yourself. These places do not only stay on the diy approach, even though many continue or focus tech-for-tech, but it has largely evolved to citizen and community science, and DIT. Public lab being a great example in the US, as you know. Thanks.
