Updates
Every Collection Tells a Story
By: Kate Harris, Learning Lab Coordinator, Pittsburgh, PA As we prepared for our third workshop with the Pittsburgh cohort of teachers, we realized one of the greatest challenges for teachers new to the Learning Lab was building and using collections in meaningful ways. Teachers use collections all of the time, but call them by different names: primary source sets, document-based questions, webquests, etc., but we don't always thi...
Pittsburgh: Supporting Digital Innovation in Education with the Learning Lab
The Smithsonian Learning Lab launched quietly in public beta on October 30, 2015. It will officially launch at the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) Conference on June 26-29, 2016 (more on the events planned coming soon to this new site). Learning Lab project director, Darren Milligan, and I will be leading a workshop at the conference for teachers as well. In the eight months between the public beta launch a...
Celebrating Teacher Appreciation Week!
On Monday, May 2, the Smithsonian Center for Learning and Digital Access (the team behind the Smithsonian Learning Lab) as well as educators from across the Institution, hosted the 56 Teachers of the Year in an all-day professional development event as part of their "Washington Week." This annual event, now in its 10th year, has become a favorite of the museum educators I collaborate with here at the Smithsonian. This year, we were ...
Celebrating 10 Years with the Teachers of the Year!
Next Monday, the Smithsonian Center for Learning and Digital Access (SCLDA) will host the 56 State Teachers of the Year for a day of professional learning focused on using digital museum resources in the classroom.For ten years now, this collaboration has allowed the Smithsonian and the Council of Chief State School Officers to accomplish two major goals: (1) continued training and professional development for Teachers of the Year and (2) making Smithsonian learning...
Creating an Urgent Desire: Marketing the Learning Lab
A couple of weeks ago, we welcomed Kristen Plemon and Ileana Rowe of Plemon Communications to DC to kick off a yearlong marketing and public relations project to launch the Learning Lab. I jotted down a couple of goals at the two-day meeting (in which we were also very lucky to have with us Erika Ferrin and Gabe Kosowitz who work in the Smithsonian's internal communications team): Create an urgent desire to use the Smithsonian f...
