Carolyn Royston on the NMOLP

National Museums Online Learning Project

MCG Conference

19 June 2008

Who we are

Carolyn Royston

Project Manager, NMOLP

Richard Morgan

Web Technical Manager, V&A

V&A

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What we are going to talk about

Tell you more about the project

Focus on the technologies used to deliver the project

How they are deployed to maximise flexibility and encourage re-use

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Who’s in the project?

British Museum

Imperial War Museum

National Portrait Gallery

Natural History Museum

Royal Armouries

Sir John Soane’s Museum

Tate

Victoria and Albert Museum

Wallace Collection

What is it?

3 year digital learning project funded by the Treasury

Sponsored by DCMS

Due to launch in March 2009

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Aims of the project

Increase the use of the digital collections of the 9 museums

(no new website)

No new digitisation or curatorial content

Encourage a more creative and critical use of partners’ online resources

Increase confidence levels in the use of the collections

Create sustainable high-quality online resources for each of the partners (value added)

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Copyright EDS

Partnership work

Spent time at beginning of project working specifically on partnership issues– Developed a common vision

– Set of principles for how we were going to work together

– Identified what partners could achieve through the partnership that may not be achievable otherwise

– Barriers to success – museums, departments, individuals

– What added value can we provide for our users as a result of the partnership

Many layers of complexity before you even talk about technology

What are we delivering for our audiences?

Resources for schools (WebQuests)

Resources for lifelong learners (Creative Journeys)

Federated search across 9 collections

Resources that can be used & shared across all 9 national museums

Popular and exciting ways of engaging new audiences

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WebQuests

What is a WebQuest?

100 WebQuests will be created for pupils, aged 5-16

– An online learning challenge

– Flexible learning tool

– Involves use of at least 3 partner collections

– Mapped to curriculum

Users will be able to:– Complete learning challenges,

develop critical skills using the collections including research, analysis and synthesis of information

– Learn how to effectively use the collections in their research

Some of the challenges

Asking pupils to research content that is not written for them

Provide support for pupils when searching the collections

Partners working collaboratively to create meaningful collection links

Ensure that partners are left with a sustainable content authoring tool & process that will enable creation of future WebQuests, individually and cross-partner

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Creative Journeys

What is a Creative Journey?

A space for users to document & share how partner collections inspire their own creative work and process

Users will be able to:– Create, post and share journeys on

partner museum websites

– Use different web technologies to present and author their journeys, and comment on others

– 30 videos showing a range of people who have been inspired by the collections

– Dynamic, changing user generated content shared and integrated across the partnership

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What are our challenges?

How do we build & sustain our Creative Journeys communities – individually and as a partnership?

Challenge to curatorial authority and reputation

Work with the messiness and complexity around new ways of communicating and use of the collections

Copyright

Moderation

AND despite this…

Partners have chosen to engage with these issues & have a go!

Shared risk, shared success

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Federated search

Not part of the original implementation plan

We have developed a cross-collection search because:– User need and usability: create a better user experience

– Content driven: the resources are designed to maximise use of the collections

– Partnership: add value to working together

This is NOT a cross-collection search project – this is a project that uses a cross-collection search

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This is NOT a search project…

Technical solution driven by project objectives:– A multi-partner project, with widely different capability & capacity

– Needs to effectively serve WebQuests & Creative Journeys

– Can be implemented by each partner

– Must deliver by March 2009

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Technical Solution

Potential legacy of NMOLP

Demonstrating a productive and effective partnership model

Innovative cross-departmental working – education, curatorial and technical

Building a sustainable and scaleable model with potential for future re-use and growth across the sector

A critical mass of high-quality digital learning resources using museum online collections

Linking national collections in meaningful ways

Powerful content creation tools that partners have developed together and available for future use, by each partner and for future partnership work

Incorporating existing popular digital tools to reach & engage audiences e.g. YouTube, Facebook, Flickr

Developing Copyright and Moderation policies available for sector to build on