Reich Rawson, Elizabeth. “It’s About Them: Using Developmental Frameworks to Create Exhibitions for Children (and Their Grown-ups).” In Connecting Kids to History with Museum Exhibitions, edited by D. Lynn McRainey and John Russick, 49-73. Walnut Creek, CA: Left Coast Press, 2010.
In this chapter, Reich Rawson explores the question of exhibitions as it shifts from “what is this exhibition about?” to “who is this exhibition for?” Museums are moving towards becoming more visitor-centric as museum exhibitions and programming are being designed. Reich Rawson, in her position as a curator at the Brooklyn Children’s Museum, explores the use of a developmental framework when creating history exhibitions for children. She begins with an explanation of developmental frameworks and then lists four lines of inquiry when researching them: children’s developmental milestones or ages, front-end evaluation to determine prior knowledge, literature review to locate one’s place in the field, and curriculum goals and objectives in relation to the exhibition topic. Reich Rawson discusses each of the four lines of inquiry using charts and examples to buoy her argument. For example, she uses children and historical thinking to situate the topic. Reich Rawson then explains how to create a developmental framework and how to apply it to exhibition development. She explains how to apply the framework when the exhibit is being conceptualized, the formative evaluation stage, when the exhibit is being designed and in the final design stages. Reich Rawson states that an exhibition that uses a developmental framework, which has been vetted through the process outlined in this chapter, will produce exhibitions that “truly are learning environments tailor-made to engage all our visitors.”