Archaeology and Education – London Museum Visit

A few weeks ago (actually during a London Tube Strike) we took a field trip to the London Museum (which is a museum dedicated to the history of London).  It is one of the museums in London that does it “right”.  Dr. Mike Corbishley, our course teacher, toured us around pointing out things that he thought were better or worse from an educational perspective.  I was wondering if this was a good post or not but decided to go ahead with it as those who are teachers might find this post informative for when they do field trips, those associated with museums might like the information to help evaluate how they do their work, and those who visit museums might like to have another way of looking at what is displayed.

We were first asked to evaluate a display on Prehistoric London.  Half of us were asked to find good things and half were asked to find bad things.  The bad included that the display wasn’t clear in the story it was trying to tell, there were too many words in the displays, and objects were displayed too high or too low.  The good reported back that they liked that the objects were displayed as they were found in an archaeological context (ie skeleton in dirt burial complete with artifacts found around it), there were informative videos, and there were many models that reconstructed the ancient buildings/life of the people who used the objects we were looking at.

Between the Prehistoric display and the Roman display (the two major displays in this museum) was a temporary display about archaeology.  It illustrated briefly how archaeology was done.  At a glance one could easily see and understand the basic processes.

Our last stop was the large Roman display.  Dr. Corbishley pointed out the signage in this display area.  The display signs had two main sentences in large print, utilizing different font for the summary, followed by clear captions with illustrations.  Again, at a glance, a visitor could easily know what they were looking at.  If they wanted to know just a little more it was there as well.

In one display, tiny bits of metal from a Roman soldier’s armor was set on a wall over a picture of a Roman soldier in full battle gear in the place it went on that armor so that it was easy to tell what the metal bits were.  This illustrates how the staff at the museum makes an effort to design for learning.

One thing he didn’t think they got right was the route.  The Roman display is a “free” route, meaning that the visitor can go wherever they like and in any order they like.  The problem with this is that someone who is new stands the chance of missing something and not realizing it until the trip home when someone else mentions that they saw something cool … and the first person realizes then that they didn’t.  With a “fixed” route a story can be constructed and the visitor won’t accidentally miss something.

But this museum got a lot more right than they did wrong.  Visitors don’t want to see miles and miles of Greek pots.  The London Museum displays objects selectively and in context (either archaeologically as already mentioned or in the context of use).  They have a Roman street that is “theatrical” in its structure.  The visitor knows they are not on an actual Roman street but they still get the “feel” for it.  The displays along it are “in ancient context of use”.  This “closed” environment (with buildings on each side and displays built into them) also allows for sound to be better captured and heard by the visitor without disturbing other parts of the museum.  It has “bird’s eye view” models with the little people constructing the various buildings so the visitor can understand the use and what those buildings were for.  There are “touching and doing things”, cut-aways, signs asking questions (answered in the display), half walls for school children to have a flat surface to write on when filling out their worksheets instead of ropes, evidence is seen in the reconstructions (some lifesized for storytellers and actors), walls to project video on, “sitting down places” not just to rest but to consider more complicated displays (like in an art gallery does), and not many walls behind displays so that the visitors can walk all the way around nearly every display and see the “backside” of the objects as well.

I enjoyed this museum and will try to get back to it to take photographs of some of the things I found memorable for future use.  If you are in London, I highly recommend taking a half-day and checking out this museum.  If you have a class you want to take, they also have special rooms for young students to learn.