Practitioner-driven synthesis of museum family learning conversations research
Ended Project Grant Awarded Last action
- Award ID
- 2415448
- Recipient
-
The Science Museum Of Minnesota UEI FMBEN7W54M58
- Awarding agency
-
Division of Research on Learning in Formal and Informal Settings
National Science Foundation
- Obligated
- $0
Award facts
- Assistance listing
- 47.076 STEM Education (formerly Education and Human Resources)
- Completion date
- Funding agency
- National Science Foundation
- Place of performance
- St Paul, MN 55102, USA
Award details come from USAspending.gov.
Description
- Abstract
- The science museum of minnesota (SMM), in partnership with the university of minnesota (UMN) and bakken museum, is conducting a practitioner-driven synthesis of museum family learning conversations (FLC) research. The project team, which includes researchers, librarians, museum educators, and experience designers, aims to bridge research and practitioner knowledges to produce bidirectional insights for the future of museum design and museum-based learning research. The research involves gathering, scoping, and synthesizing 25 years of research and evaluation on family learning conversations conducted in museum settings, and formally incorporating practitioner-generated knowledge to spark the next generation of design and research on family learning in museums. This project is structured differently than a traditional synthesis in order to achieve the broadest impacts. Museum practitioners drive the synthesis, contributing their own practice-based knowledge, questions, and critical commentary to each part of the synthesis work. For practitioners, literature syntheses that identify how their existing ideas relate to research findings provide ecologically grounded and accessible insights for design. For researchers, understanding how practitioners identify learning or valuable interactions distinct from what has been valued in FLC research historically provides fertile ground for innovation in research methods and research questions. By bringing researchers with expertise in informal learning, video-based discourse analysis, and evidence synthesis into collaboration with museum educators, designers, and evaluators from institutions of varying size and emphases, the project is synthesizing research knowledge and practice knowledge that is fundamentally practitioner-driven, making knowledge in informal learning research more accessible to practitioners, and generating new questions and insights for further practical and research development. This work contributes directly to advancing knowledge through synthesis of 25 years of museum family learning conversations research in direct response to museum practitioners, while attending to how shifting values in museum education have shaped prior research and require new directions for future work. Using both rigorous literature synthesis processes and ongoing collaborative partnership with a cohort of museum educators, designers, and evaluators, the project is reactivating this literature and research approach, providing practical guidance for research design based in intertwined research and practitioner knowledges and charting a new vision forward for museum family learning research. The work involves first describing the existing knowledge of research and practitioners regarding design for FLC and then generating a focused mixed methods meta-synthesis on a practitioner-prioritized line-of-research. The project team is also engaging in a critical reflection on research methods used in FLC research and identifying underlying values shaping current knowledge and new avenues of investigation to further knowledge generation. Through targeted dissemination to museum practitioner and museum family learning researchers, the project aims to create BI-directional learning and to make the wealth of FLC research more accessible and interpretable through a rigorous synthesis that centers the values and priorities of museum practitioners at every stage of the work. This integrating research and practice project is funded by the advancing informal stem learning (AISL) program, which seeks to advance new approaches to, and evidence-based understanding of, the design and development of stem learning in informal environments. This includes providing multiple pathways for broadening access to and engagement in stem learning experiences. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.- subawards are planned for this award.
Transactions
| Action | Obligated | Date |
|---|---|---|
| Amendment | -$499,743 | |
| Amendment | $0 | |
| Amendment | $0 | |
| Original award | $499,743 |
Quick answers
Who received award 2415448?
2415448 was awarded to The Science Museum Of Minnesota by Division of Research on Learning in Formal and Informal Settings (National Science Foundation) on September 1, 2024.
How much is award 2415448 worth?
$0 has been obligated on 2415448.
Which agency awarded 2415448?
Division of Research on Learning in Formal and Informal Settings (National Science Foundation) awarded 2415448, with funding from National Science Foundation.
On GovTribe
See this award's full record
- Every transaction and subaward
- The recipient's other awards and teaming partners
- Similar grant awards
- Ask GovTribe AI about this award