Creating CREATE: turning a festival of events into an online learning platform

Linda helping me present despite being unprepared for a hybrid event.

Quite poetically, after being prevented from attending the AMAGA 2021 Conference in Canberra due to the latest COVID restrictions, I needed to quickly adapt my presentation on adapting programming to digital formats, into a Zoom presentation. Delivering remotely from home to a room full of in-person attendees listening to otherwise physical presentations was an odd experience. But thanks to our newly honed skills in flexibly adapting to sudden change, Lynda Kelly and I were able to make it work.

I presented on the development of the website We The Makers CREATE – an interactive platform to learn and share for all ages. This project was in response to the cancellation of a major festival of events planned for the Museum for our We The Makers exhibition. I’ve previously written about the development of the digital exhibition and CREATE as a sister website.

A program festival was going to print when we shut our doors and went home. In a short time we needed to adapt the programs to digital experiences. Family events became stop motion videos for craft activities: such as weaving a friendship bracelet and making pom poms. Public workshops with local artists became Inspiration At Home: short videos to inspire making at home using fabric with crafts such as furoshiki and Karen weaving. Masterclasses with established artists became online courses in Slow Stitching, Natural Dying, Repurposed Fashion and Recycled Jewelry. And a public exhibition of handmade wearables became an online gallery.

To make this happen during lockdown was not easy. I was posting vlogging kits to artists in their homes, assisting with transferring and editing large video files, developing consistent branding without being able to control the content. The artists, however, were adaptable, resilient and willing to give it a try. Supporting them, both financially and technically, was critical.

I highlighted some of the success and learnings from the project. Successes included: audience reach, engagement with and support for artists, partnerships with other organisations to share content, selecting methods to overcome technical limitations (eg. stop motion) and a public platform for sharing. Learnings from the project included: negotiating intellectual property for the artists, creating meaningful and attractive experiences amongst a flood of digital experiences (ie. online events coinciding with digital fatigue at the end of lockdowns) and creating an easy user experience.

Ultimately the project was a golden opportunity for the Museum, and for me professionally, to test our ideas and push our boundaries, developing new digital skills and reaching new audiences that would not have happened with the physical events.

Connecting an exhibition beyond the museum’s walls

Summer 20/21 provided another opportunity to use the limitations posed by COVID as inspiration to try something new. While Victoria was opening back up, audiences were still cautious and reimposed restrictions were a real possibility. For us, this meant that our stalwart of programming – hands-on craft-based experiences indoors – had to be reimagined.

To create opportunities for safe participation and learning I needed to look beyond the museum’s walls and connect with our friends and partners – supporting each other to develop meaningful experiences for our community and visitors.

For our visiting exhibition Wildlife Photographer of the Year we partnered with the Geelong Botanic Gardens to run outside photography workshops and develop an Urban Wildlife Trail between the Museum and the Gardens.

Our other visiting exhibition How Cities Work provided a whole different challenge – as a hands-on exhibition targeted at children cleaning and safety became paramount to decision making. With visitor limits and closure periods for cleaning, it was essential to develop a program that encouraged engagement with the exhibition without overwhelming traffic inside the exhibition.

The solution was to drawn on the concepts of the exhibition – urban life and design – and take them out into the City. To explore how cities work within the example of our own city: Geelong. I conceptualised an idea that involved a map-based scavenger-hunt style activity that revealed hidden or overlooked features of the city. Then working with a range of City departments, organisations and business, refined the activity to seven key sites to discover.

I engaged the exhibition artist, James Gulliver Hancock, to build on the artistic theme in the exhibition and create an illustrated map of Geelong. This beautiful map guided the participants around the city to the seven sites. At each site they collected a further illustration, with information about the specific City feature, which could be added to their map, with some becoming pop-ups or lift-flaps, similar to the How Cities Work book. Five of the sites also had vinyl decals that revealed more details – such as what was under the pavement or inside the smart bin.

The activity, called How Geelong Works, gave us the opportunity to encourage participation in a COVID safe way that was also meaningful, locally relevant and hands-on fun!

Not forgetting hands-on in the digital pandemic

StoryCraft learning resource packs for local prep students to support remote learning during the pandemic.

While we, like many cultural institutions, were busy trying to ‘pivot’ our programs to digital experiences we noticed an opportunity to provide an alternative, tactile experience for an audience who may face difficulties accessing or using digital resources – early years students from disadvantaged communities.

In response to this we set to work to create physical remote learning packs for prep students from disadvantaged schools in the local area. These learning kits were designed to build literacy learning, fine-motor skill development and wellbeing, as well as share stories relevant to the Museum and local history. They featured a picture book by a local author plus craft materials and instructions to make pom poms, finger knitted animals, plus a woven cloud and rainbow.

Although the kits were designed for remote learning they were delivered after the resumption of face to face teaching. This gave teachers the opportunity to utilise them in a manner that suited them and their students: as individualised learning resources or home learning activities.

The response to the kits was extremely positive with feedback such as:

“Students LOVED making the pom poms.”

“The resources and lesson plans accompanying them were outstanding!”

The packs “supported development of fine motor skills, speaking and listening and the development of vocabulary.”

“On behalf of our students, school and families, thank you for the opportunity to access such thoughtful resources and activities that provided our students with a new experience and challenge.”

Our team was delighted to use resources and skills for hands-on learning program delivery, which we couldn’t provide in person, to create a program with a positive impact for over 250 grateful students and teachers.