Digital Technologies & 21st Century Learning

1. Personalized Learning: How to Discover the Tools That Will Enable Teachers, Students, and Everyone to Find, Understand, and Adapt Museum Resources Museums, scientific and cultural institutions must play a major role to ignite a new generation of creativity-based, personalized learners. As more institutional assets are made or born digital, we, as technologists, educators, and communicators must expand our focus to understanding our user needs beyond findability and offer the tools that allow them to understand and then adapt our content, whether through the building of new tools or the sharing of our content in platforms where these tools exist. In this session, the Smithsonian Center for Education and Museum Studies (SCEMS) presents a multi-phased strategy that addresses their Institution's need to update their relationship with educators. This project was designed to change online users of museum assets from passive recipients of prescribed content into active creators of digital resources personalized for learning in their own classrooms. It was also designed to change the nature of the responsibility that this national outreach office holds at its Institution. Presenters: Darren Milligan, Senior Media Designer/Webmaster, Smithsonian Institution, Smithsonian Center for Education and Museum Studies 2. Shifting Our Perspective to Meet the Needs of 21st Century Learners What do we do when 21st century learners challenge the museum community to develop new ways to engage and educate? The Minnesota Historical Society has undertaken a major initiative to change programs ranging from field trips to curriculum so as to meet the learning needs of this future generation. Shana Crosson, project lead for the online components, describes the significant research done by staff, initial project results, shifting staff paradigms and future project plans. Presenter: Shana Crosson, Web Content Manager, Minnesota Historical Society Session Chair: Rosanna Flouty, Director of Education, Art21 Presented Friday, Nov 9, 2012 at the Museum Computer Network Conference in Seattle, WA. mcn.edu