The Online Platform for Children in Museum of Arts with Constructivist Learning Principles

Abstract

(Background and Purpose) Culture and artistic institutions such as museums and art galleries provide opportunities to people to enjoy artistic value in society through exhibitions and educational programs to enhance their creativity. Visitors to these museums are people of all ages, from elderly, adults, teenagers, to children. Since the level of understanding and interest of visitors is so varied, the exhibitions and programs should be considered on how to communicate with everyone. In particular, taking into account the contemporary need for active digital access, and considering children for whom constructivist learning is important, it attempts to understand how the online platform for children in museums should be designed for educational purposes. The purpose of this study is to find a way to implement these principles in the online platform design for children while advocating to apply the principles derived from museum exhibitions through a constructivist learning theory. (Method) Based on Luhmann's definition of communication operation as constructivist, this study examines Hein's work explaining the method of constructivist education, and Hooper-Greenhill's work claiming constructivist exhibitions in museums. In addition, various communication obstacles and visitors' attention were reviewed. For primary research, interviews with a global exhibition designer were conducted, and as a result, the principles of exhibition design that induce excellent constructivist learning were extracted. Later, two case studies followed with MetKids of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and TateKids of Tate Modern in order to examine how these principles were developed. (Results) Constructivist principles can be arranged in line with the communication process of information, utterance and interpretation. First, target messages should be structured through an easily understandable structure. It also utilizes emotional metaphors that are familiar to users. Second, an exhibition creates motivation, provides experience opportunities for different levels and styles, and helps attention. Third, social interaction is strengthened to encourage viewers' interpretation. Fourth, the idea of meaning discovered and learned leads to follow-up learning. (Conclusions) In conclusion, the exhibitions and programs in a museum is a communication provided for various age groups, and the principle of constructivist learning needs to be applied. This can be equally expanded and utilized in online platforms as well as in on-site exhibitions and education programs. Constructivist learning principles can be implemented through various design directions. These include 5 elements as follows: a sentence or metaphor that unites the whole, structure in which learning is dynamically circulated, linking visitors' interests to the contents of a museum, providing the initiative in information selection, and interaction that induces perspective. Therefore, by referring to these design directions, museums can build a constructivist learning platform using their own contents.