I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens
sethpurcell.com
I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens
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Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens
#2It’s not just museums. Schools today also face the challenge of limiting screens in favor of hands-on activities.
Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens
#3the exploratorium in san francisco has also been dumbed down.
the old palace of fine arts exploratorium had a working TESLA COIL !
Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens
#4One of my longstanding peeves is that art museums are treated as serious places for grown-ups but science museums and zoos are treated as places for kids.
Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens
#5> But these physical exhibits require maintenance, and I was dismayed to see that several are in bad repair; some of them weren’t even working anymore, some seemed worn out, or didn’t seem well-designed to begin with.
To be fair, that's what I remember children's museums being like in the 1980s as well. A significant number of exhibits would be temporarily out of order on any given day.
I don't think screens are responsible for that. Maintaining physical exhibits that can survive constant physical contact with kids is hard.
Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens
#6One of my longstanding peeves is that art museums are treated as serious places for grown-ups but science museums and zoos are treated as places for kids.
I get the economics of it for science museums, but at least science museums in major cities tend to have adults-only nights now.
Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens
#7One of my longstanding peeves is that art museums are treated as serious places for grown-ups but science museums and zoos are treated as places for kids.
I visited part of the Smithsonian recently (the natural history museum) and the level of patronizing displays is truly incredible. It seems pretty clear that if you're more than 10 years old, you're not supposed to be in there. But that feels like a development of recent decades.
On the other hand, zoos seem to have become more adult-oriented and less children-oriented over time.
Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens
#8One of my longstanding peeves is that art museums are treated as serious places for grown-ups but science museums and zoos are treated as places for kids.
Art museums could be made friendlier for kids, but they would need significant design and maintenance effort. In particular: many kids need a lot of running around, want to play with things with their hands, and get quickly bored just standing and looking at artworks. It would be nice if there were better art museums for kids though.
(For what it's worth, there are plenty of non-interactive and thus boring-for-kids science, technology, history, etc. museums if you look around.)
Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens
#9One of my longstanding peeves is that art museums are treated as serious places for grown-ups but science museums and zoos are treated as places for kids.
Just for clarification, are you upset that art museums tend to be less kid-focused, or that science museums and zoos tend to be overly kid focused? Both seem to be things to be potentially concerned about IMO.
Re: I didn't bring my son to a museum to look at screens
#10One of my longstanding peeves is that art museums are treated as serious places for grown-ups but science museums and zoos are treated as places for kids.
I get the economics of it for science museums, but at least science museums in major cities tend to have adults-only nights now.
Where the adults get to act like kids and drink.
They don't add substance to the exhibits, they don't attempt to educate, they just attempt to tap an adjacent market for the same dumbed down slop.
(Don't get me wrong, I'm a big fan of the _idea_, just a huge critic of the _implementation_.)