Volume 12 - Issue 68
/ August 2023
85
http:// www.amazoniainvestiga.info ISSN 2322- 6307
DOI: https://doi.org/10.34069/AI/2023.68.08.8
How to Cite:
Karamanov, O., Surmach, O., Kravchenko, O., Polishchuk, N., & Albul, I. (2023). Museum educational activities in the context of
disseminating modern scientific knowledge. Amazonia Investiga, 12(68), 85-92. https://doi.org/10.34069/AI/2023.68.08.8
Museum educational activities in the context of disseminating modern
scientific knowledge
Освітня діяльність музеїв у контексті поширення сучасного наукового знання
Received: June 2, 2023 Accepted: July 21, 2023
Written by:
Oleksiy Karamanov1
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0067-0747
Oksana Surmach2
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4165-0416
Oksana Kravchenko3
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9732-6546
Nataliia Polishchuk4
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3677-1248
Iryna Albul5
https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7056-3157
Abstract
The purpose of the study is to analyse the content
and focus of the educational activities of
museums on the dissemination of modern
scientific knowledge and ideas of scientific
education. Scientific education is increasingly
acquiring interdisciplinary and integrative
content as a synthesis of natural, technical, and
humanitarian knowledge in formal, non-formal,
and informal education, or in conditions of their
complementary integration. The authors
conducted an online survey of 42 respondents
(teachers of Ukrainian secondary schools,
teachers of universities, and museum workers)
who answered 10 questions of the questionnaire
about the organization, drafting, and
implementation of museum educational
(museum pedagogical) programmes to
communicate with pupils and students in the
museum environment with the opportunity to
express their own attitude to the suggested
problems. The survey results proved that
1
Doctor of Sciences (Pedagogy), Professor at the Department of General Pedagogy and Pedagogy of Higher School, Head of the
Laboratory of Museum Pedagogy. Ivan Franko National University of Lviv, Ukraine. WoS Researcher ID: IAN-5627-2023
2
Ph.D. (History), Associate Professor, Director of the Pedagogical College, Ivan Franko National University of Lviv, Ukraine. WoS
Researcher ID: GYN-9999-2022
3
Doctor of Sciences (Pedagogy), Professor at the Department of Social Education and Social Work, Dean of the Faculty of Social
Work and Psychological Education. Pavlo Tychyna Uman State Pedagogical University, Ukraine. WoS Researcher ID:
AAS-4767-2021
4
Lecturer at the Department of Medical and Biological Fundamentals of Physical Culture. Pavlo Tychyna Uman State Pedagogical
University, Ukraine.
5
Ph.D. (Pedagogy), Head of the Department of Social Education and Social Work. Pavlo Tychyna Uman State Pedagogical
University, Ukraine. WoS Researcher ID: ISV-0216-2023
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teachers of secondary schools and teachers of
higher education institutions have a significant
interest in the introduction of educational
(museum pedagogical) programmes into the
environment of national museums with minor
visiting reservations, associated with quarantine
restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic. The
article analyses the peculiarities of functioning of
museum institutions in the system of organizing
various types of educational activities with
visitors in accordance with the dominant
paradigm of education and upbringing. The role
and significance of the most important
educational paradigms in the system of museum
pedagogical activity are outlined. The role of
modern museums in promoting and
disseminating ideas of scientific knowledge in
various forms and methods of work with young
people is emphasized.
Keywords: museum, educational activity,
museum pedagogy, educational paradigm,
scientific knowledge.
Introduction
The key characteristics of the development of the
educational sector at the beginning of the 21st
century have undergone many changes and
transformations due to cardinal transformations
of the very nature of learning, focused on
independent acquiring of knowledge through
various studies, a wide interdisciplinary
awareness of a child in various areas of life,
changes in the educational paradigm, and the
spread of ideas of scientific education.
The organization of the learning process in
educational institutions is increasingly taking
into account the contexts of informality,
creativity, critical thinking, visualization,
interactivity, which leads to seeking the
environment of an informal institution a
museum.
It is the pedagogical potential of the museum as
an environment of effective informal
communication in today’s conditions that has
inexhaustible reserves and opportunities that can
radically reorganize the educational process,
make it more meaningful, focused, exciting, and
informative for each child.
The necessity of this study is due to the need to
determine the peculiarities of the development of
one of the most popular areas of modern museum
and pedagogical activity science education, the
main postulates of which are implemented in
modern centres of science and technology,
research on museum pedagogy covers many
areas of human life, helping to comprehend
different contexts of its activity by means of the
museum when creating an appropriate
environment that can have an educational, social,
didactic, therapeutic, adaptive, cognitive
colouring and promotes personal development.
The article will reveal the importance of
scientific education as a system of creative
thinking in the formation of a persons scientific
culture, study the role of educational activities of
museums in the process of disseminating
scientific knowledge, analyse the results of a
survey on the effectiveness and possibilities of
implementing educational programmes in
museum practice, and explore the importance of
museum pedagogy in the context of
disseminating modern scientific knowledge,
focusing on the role of museum (museum-
pedagogical) programmes.
Literature Review
The issues raised are considered fragmentarily in
the scientific literature and reflected, in
particular, in the works by M. Xanthoudaki,
B. Tirelli, P. Cerutti, & S. Calcagnini (2007),
Yu. Hotsulyak, & M. Halchenko (2016),
N. Polikhun, I. Slipukhina, & I. Chernetskyi
(2018), however, they require special extended
research.
Karamanov, O., Surmach, O., Kravchenko, O., Polishchuk, N., Albul, I. / Volume 12 - Issue 68: 85-92 / August, 2023
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In our opinion, these scientific works do not fully
address the issue of educational activities of
museums in the context of science education, as
they are more concerned with general issues of
science education. considering it as a system of
innovations, the importance of interdisciplinary
pedagogical research and the general goals of
implementing the ideas of science education in
the museum space, without sufficiently outlining
practical recommendations. In our study, we will
fill this gap by analysing the different vectors of
educational activities of museums in the context
of disseminating modern scientific knowledge
and ideas of science education.
Scientific education can be identified with a
purposeful system of formation of creative
scientific thinking in the process of obtaining
subjectively and objectively new knowledge by
the methods of scientific cognition.
In particular, this concept is interpreted as:
The highest level of professional education
(obtained in postgraduate, doctoral studies,
etc.).
Scientific content of education (didactic
principle of scientificity).
An innovative pedagogical paradigm for the
integration of education and science, which
seeks to bring the educational activities of
pupils as close as possible to the research
activities, to involve them in solving
educational and real scientific problems
(Hotsulyak, & Halchenko, 2016, pp. 511).
The latter definition is of fundamental
importance for us, because any innovative
activity in the museum environment is to some
extent always associated with the organization of
research work of pupils and students in the
process of studying a scientific phenomenon,
discussing the results of experience, analysing
the phenomenon.
The complexity of scientific education is
expressed in the cross-cutting, interdisciplinary,
and integrative nature of its content and is
implemented with an emphasis on the natural
sciences and their combination with other
academic disciplines, on the synthesis of natural,
technical, and humanitarian knowledge in the
system of formal, non-formal, and informal
education, or in conditions of their
complementary integration.
The educational process of scientific education is
associated with problematic, research, and
project-oriented teaching methods, and dynamic
curricula that are pedagogically adapted to
different age categories (Hotsulyak, &
Halchenko, 2016, pp. 511).
Researchers interpret scientific education as a
scientific culture of an individual, the purpose of
which is to attract the individual to the cultural
values of science; a special kind of cognitive
activity aimed at formation of the personality of
an experimenter, researcher, scientist; a
purposeful process of learning and education
based on modern achievements of science,
engineering, and technology in order to obtain
knowledge and develop skills, as well as to form
general cultural and professional competencies in
the modern information society for personal self-
realization and development of society as a
whole (Polikhun et al., 2018, p. 187).
What is the fundamental difference between
scientific knowledge and information and
general knowledge? First of all, it is the
systematization of results, structuredness and
verifiability, which determine its authenticity,
reliability, and credibility. Therefore, in the
process of learning, unverified general
knowledge is often rewritten from one
manuscript to another, leading to
misunderstanding and lack of realizing the
meaning of what the subject of teaching is, what
the expected results are, etc.
We can see a similar situation in the museum
pedagogy, because the meaning of this concept is
mostly perceived on the basis of the traditional
approach to understanding pedagogical activity
in various areas of human knowledge, based on a
knowledge-oriented educational paradigm, as
well as without taking into account the various
contexts of its application and interrelation with
related museum pedagogical concepts and
categories.
Indirect, incompletely clear and delimited
understanding of the content and nature of
museum pedagogy, which scientists, teachers,
and methodologists distinguish from the
interdisciplinary field of knowledge and
scientific discipline at the intersection of
museology, pedagogy, and psychology, to the
scheme of analysis of educational activities in the
museum, often leads to an incorrect
understanding of the very content of the
educational activities of museums, in which they
begin to include ordinary games, quizzes,
competitions in the museum that do not have
clearly defined goals and results of activities,
occur spontaneously, and do not take into
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account the differentiated composition of
participants.
The result is non-compliance with the modern
requirements of the established forms and
methods of educational work of the museum with
visitors, which often reflect only certain parts of
the wide palette of modern understanding of the
ways of organizing learning in the museum
environment, because education is a complex,
open, non-linear social system, a social
institution, and an area of spiritual production
(Krysovatyi, 2015, p. 118).
The decisive element that reconciles the
contradictions between education and the
museum can be scientific education and
scientific knowledge, which, in our opinion,
qualitatively complement the different
interpretations of museum pedagogy:
In conjunction with the concepts of ‘cultural
and educational activities of museums’,
‘museum education’, ‘pedagogy of museum
activities’, etc.
As a meaningful activity in the museum
environment, which in different historical
eras depended on the dominant educational
paradigm, the model of the museum, and the
types of visitors.
As a modern educational and training
technology, which makes it possible to
implement research and project work in the
museum, thus contributing to the
introduction of innovative activities.
For example, the latter provision is an important
element of museum educational models that
implement the project method and include
teacher training, classroom work using museum
resources, visiting the museum, applying this
method as a basis for teaching and learning with
integration of various activities.
In particular, it is based on a deep and ongoing
collaboration between the school teacher and the
museum educator, as teachers contribute to
formal education and combine non-formal
education into a collaborative workflow in which
the two institutions learn from each other in the
interest of scientific education. In this context, it
is necessary to significantly strengthen the role
and importance of museums as tools for teaching
and learning through long-term educational
activities.
Therefore, the museum institution is increasingly
perceived as an expert that promotes
methodology and attracts pupils with knowledge,
rather than imposes one-sided meanings. This
new role is in line with the direction in which
science museums and research centres are
currently operating, from scientific literacy and
public understanding of science to shaping
personal meaning and public engagement in
science and research (Xanthoudaki et al., 2007,
p. 7).
The project work is actively implemented in
modern centres of science and technology, which
enable young people to better navigate in various
technical mechanisms, understand the principles
of their work, and be aware of the prospects for
new scientific inventions. This is extremely
relevant, because, for instance, in the United
States, about 70% of jobs today require
specialized knowledge and skills (compared to
5% at the beginning of the last century)
(Koshmanova, 2013, p. 347).
The purpose of the article is to analyse the
content and orientation of the educational
activities of museums in the context of
dissemination of modern scientific knowledge
and ideas of scientific education.
Understanding and awareness of various
theoretical and applied aspects of this activity in
the museum environment leads us to a deeper
analysis of the ‘scientific education’ term.
Methodology
Museums can successfully implement in their
practice various everyday opportunities for the
promotion of knowledge and motivation of
pupils and students to study and scientific
activity. To do this, they create special
educational museum programmes that
correspond to the principles of cognitive,
behavioural, and emotional development of a
young person, contribute to increasing the
effectiveness of their knowledge, and motivate
them to study more.
To find out the effectiveness and possibilities of
introducing educational programmes into
museum practice, we conducted a study among
teachers of national secondary schools, teachers
of higher education institutions, and museum
workers on the effectiveness of these
programmes for working with pupil and student
youth. In particular, the peculiarities of operation
of educational and museum institutions during
the COVID-19 pandemic were taken into
account.
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The study was conducted in the form of an online
survey and covered a questionnaire of 10
questions on the organization, drafting and
implementation of museum educational
(museum pedagogical) programmes in the
practice of communication with pupils and
students in the museum environment with the
opportunity to express their own attitude to the
suggested issues. The total number of
respondents was 42 people.
Results and Discussion
The results of the survey make it possible to
establish that the absolute majority of
respondents (92%) support the idea of expanding
the boundaries of cultural and educational
(pedagogical and educational) activities of the
museum. Approximately the same number (93%)
support the idea of creating museum and
pedagogical programmes to expand
communication in the museum.
The respondents primarily indicated interactivity
(88%), the development of creative thinking
(85%), and cognitive character (83%) as the basis
on which museum pedagogical programmes
should be based.
This is not surprising, because any museum
programme in its essence can significantly
change interest in a particular museum
institution, contribute to its promotion at the
regional and national levels.
Describing the importance of the
interdisciplinary content and nature of museum
pedagogical programmes, the respondents
pointed to the importance of covering various
fields of knowledge in the context of a particular
museum and the ideas of scientific education,
and therefore, various school subjects, for
example, History, Art, Literature, Artistic
Culture, as well as Physics, Chemistry, Computer
Science, Mathematics, etc.
While responding to the question of the
components of museum pedagogical
programmes, the respondents unanimously
emphasized all three basic components of the
programmes: organizational, methodological,
and technological, the structural unity of which
makes the programme integral and complete.
They made similar statements regarding the
importance of taking into account the age and
individual characteristics of visitors, which is
facilitated by the differentiation of the orientation
of programmes (77%), visualization of content
(81%), availability of tasks (85%), optimally
directed course of each lesson (85%), and the use
of museum pedagogy means (87%).
Assessing the effectiveness of museum
pedagogical programmes, the majority of
respondents agreed that for each structural
element of an educational institution (class,
group), they should take place at least once a
month (64%), and the total number of classes
should be in the range from 3 to 7 (57%). First of
all, such classes should be interactive (95%),
characterized by maximum interest of the
audience (87%), organization of project activities
(63%), popularization of scientific education
ideas (61%), etc.
According to the respondents, programmes
focused on the traditions of tangible and
intangible cultural memory (88%), gaming
technologies (82%), the formation of cognitive
interest in various activities (79%), etc. may have
the greatest popularity in the museum institution
among the pupil and student audience.
Stressing the importance of drafting museum
pedagogical programmes as factors in the
integration of education, culture, and scientific
knowledge in the museum environment, all
respondents almost unanimously (98%)
supported the idea that these programmes should
be implemented by museum workers (teachers)
in cooperation with school teachers,
methodologists, and higher education
establishment teachers.
The results of the survey confirm the significant
interest in the introduction of educational
(museum pedagogical) programmes in the
environment of national museums among
teachers of national secondary schools, teachers
of higher education institutions, and museum
workers with minor visiting reservations. It can
be assumed that this is due to quarantine
restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The interviews that helped to collect detailed
information about the results and to interpret
them were based on the own methods of prof.
Oleksii Karamanov (Ivan Franko National
University of Lviv) and were based on his own
museum practices for pupils and students
conducted before the COVID-19 pandemic,
which covered a wide range of museum
communication methods (hero evaluation,
synchronicity, multi-level survey, etc.), as well
as a system for evaluating museum programmes
based on clarifying, interpretive, practical,
analytical, creative and evaluative questions.
They allowed us to identify the advantages of
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developing and implementing museum and
pedagogical programmes in the practice of
interaction with secondary schools and higher
education institutions in terms of their rationality,
clarity, validity and achievability of learning
objectives, interdisciplinary nature, and
consideration of age-specific features.
In this context, the idea of the need for large-scale
introduction of such programmes in museums,
centres of science and technology, science parks,
which is important for the dissemination of
modern scientific knowledge, seems relevant.
The results of the implementation of museum
pedagogical programmes are significant for
researchers and practitioners who seek to identify
the principles and methods of projecting museum
education that best contribute to the development
of knowledge and motivation in science (Martin
et al., 2016).
Decisive in this context is the consideration of
historical models of communication, learning
styles in the museum, pedagogical technologies,
as well as the basic vectors of orientation of
educational work of museum institutions.
Museums as informal institutions are able to
offer a unique and inimitable experience. They
provide access to authentic objects and unique
experiences to improve learning that is difficult
to implement at school. That’s why it is
important for museums to develop educational
programmes based on their own educational
values values that have to be clearly formulated
and applied in their daily practice (Tran, 2007).
We believe that the scientific substantiation of
any approach to understanding the content of
museum pedagogical (pedagogical and
educational) activities of the museum in dealing
with pupil and student youth is possible provided
that the relevant educational paradigm is taken
into account.
In particular, in the context of the cognitive
paradigm, we can talk about the so-called
traditional nature of museum activities, when the
following comes to the fore:
The need to provide as much information
about museum pieces as possible.
Insignificant attention to the delineation and
differentiation of the excursion material for
different age groups.
Accumulation of various semantic, value,
and emotional evaluations by visitors after
visiting a museum, which they cannot
effectively implement.
Almost complete absence of additional
tasks, flash cards, special guides for different
age groups.
Instead, a personally oriented paradigm in this
sense is characterized by much wider
opportunities and prospects for application, due
to:
Greater openness and ‘transparency’ of
museum pedagogical classes.
Focus on the creation of a museum learning
environment with appropriate attributes.
Aspirations not to memorize information,
but to the comprehensive development of the
child.
Creation of opportunities for active
cooperation at the exposition by taking into
account its thematic subject areas.
At the same time, the creative paradigm, focused
on the maximum development of the
individuality and creativity of the child, provides
for:
Greater attention to the manifestation of
creative abilities in the museum
environment by combining various
activities, subject areas, and methods of
communication.
Appropriate organization of an emotionally
rich comfortable museum learning
environment with an emphasis on
interpersonal communication.
Active involvement of creative project work
in the museum, taking into account the age
of each child.
Development of creativity, multifaceted
thinking in the process of museum classes,
together with moral responsibility for own
actions.
What does the above mean for the child’s
development? Along with the obvious
development of competencies, abilities, and
motivation to study, one should not forget about
the powerful moral educational effect of the
educational activities of museums, because
moral education:
Contributes to the expansion of the child’s
knowledge of a variety of social norms and
rules.
Develops a positive attitude of the educate to
basic social values.
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Encourages gaining the experience of social
action, which is attractive due to its value
orientation (Sysoieva, 2017, pp. 2728).
In this sense, the museum environment is a
perfect place for the implementation of numerous
educational methods and strategies. In particular,
when it comes to the dissemination of modern
scientific knowledge in the process of organizing
educational activities in museums which are
centres of science and technology, we can notice
the obvious effectiveness of moral education,
because it is done:
(where?) Only in the communities that the
child creates together with adults who are
important to the child.
(in the process of what?) Only in the
interaction and joint actions of children and
adults.
(in what way?) As the child’s
internationalization of the picture of the
adult world, joint actions with which the
child experiences.
(what for?) For helping the child master
higher, socially useful types of human
activity (Sysoieva, 2017, p. 28).
Conclusions
Based on our own research, we can state that the
interpretation of museum pedagogy in the
context of disseminating modern scientific
knowledge and the analysis of relevant
educational paradigms can be understood as:
An important practical component of
museum communication, which makes it
possible to organize and build new
relationships in the system of interaction of
visitors with the materials of the exhibition
in the museum and museum-surrounding
environment.
A modern educational and pedagogical
technology that provides a strategy and
tactics for effective communication with
visitors of all ages, determines the optimal
innovative learning strategies.
An important component of the new
educational system a combination of
accessible educational environment and
modern information and communication
tools, which is characterized by creative
design, lack of barriers, and
multifunctionality.
A powerful factor of retreat from
conventional and programmed knowledge,
which blocks creative thinking, inhibits
cognitive processes of personality
development, and lead to the formation of
consumer ideology.
A means of forming own system of values,
beliefs, and attitudes, which contributes to
the person’s understanding of his/her own
activities, lifestyle, and behaviour
(Karamanov, 2019, p. 50).
At the same time, it should be remembered that
in order to be a successful teacher, you have to
turn science into entertainment, which will
enable you to bring it as close to children as
possible, so that they do not have a sense of
power over what they study and, accordingly,
their motivation will increase (Wagner, 2012,
p. 124).
The best way to do this is to realistically assess
the attributes and characteristics of a 21st-
century pupil who is willing to create,
experiment, and innovate without fear of failure,
and who is able to demonstrate a willingness to
collaborate and work as a team (Wagner, 2012,
p. 13).
Researchers studying various challenges of
modern education emphasize the significance of
a number of the most important competencies of
graduates of educational institutions, which
include:
Critical thinking and problem solving.
Network cooperation, the ability to
communicate with others.
Agility and ability to adapt.
Proactivity and initiative.
Oral and written communication.
Assessment and analysis of information.
Curiosity and imagination (Koshmanova,
2013, pp. 350352).
Without resorting to a too detailed analysis of the
above, it is safe to say that almost all of these
competencies can be developed and improved
even from childhood in the process of organizing
a properly designed educational activity in the
museum. The key to success here can be
scientific museums, centres of science and
technology that develop scientific education
the basis of scientific knowledge, which is the
driver of progressive changes in all fields of
knowledge and ways of life of modern man.
The results of the study and the analysis of
scientific literature allow us to recognise the
importance of science education as a promising
museum and pedagogical technology that is
actively developing in the modern knowledge
society and serves as an example of combining
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the theory and practice of various fields of
knowledge.
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