Learning from Museums: American Association for State & Local History

Foreword
Preface
Chapter 1. Learning from Museums: An Introduction
Chapter 2. The Personal Dimensions of Free-Choice Learning
Chapter 3. The Sociocultural Dimensions of Learning
Chapter 4. The Physical Dimensions of Learning
Chapter 5. The Dimensions of Time (and Space)
Chapter 6. Museums and the Individual
Chapter 7. Communities of Learning
Chapter 8. Museums as Spaces and Places for Learning
Chapter 9. The Contextual Model of Learning
Chapter 10. Documenting Learning from Museums
Chapter 11. Supporting Learning in and from Museums
Chapter 12. Museums in a Learning Society
Chapter 13. The Future of Museum as Institutions of Learning
References
Index

This book is not only extremely relevant to the field of museum education today; it is vital. The authors excellently, and repeatedly from different perspectives, illustrate how people have continued to ask the wrong questions in evaluating the educational effectiveness of museums. For example, we often only focus on what new knowledge has been gained from a museum experience instead of investigating the impact museums can have on reinforcing existing knowledge, or how museum experiences collectively contribute to what people know and feel, and ultimately even who they can become. I don't see how anyone who reads this book can view the educational role of museums in society in the same way
In this second edition of Learning in Museums, Falk and Dierking present a model for understanding how we learn in museums, based upon the individual, sociocultural, and physical contexts. Both rich in content and easy to read, this book presents a contextual model of learning which is not just a profound analysis but a structured how-to, and the authors' significant background in research and deep understanding of museums' role in society lends weight to their recommendations.