I’m Nicola and I am Psychology PhD student based in the Child Study Centre at the University of Manchester.  I have previously completed an Undergraduate degree in Psychology at The Open University, and as part of my current research, I work closely with the Manchester Museum and a local primary school as part of a industry partnership funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). 

I’m just about to start my PhD but I have spent the past year completing a research project as part of a Masters degree in Psychology.  This involved talking to groups of parents of pre-school children from ethnic minority backgrounds to explore their perceptions and experiences of museums.  The idea was to gain an insight into why these groups in our communities are often underrepresented in museum attendance.  There is an abundance of existing research that highlights the educational benefits museums offer to all of their visitors, particularly children who are in the early stages of learning and exploring an exciting new world.  We want to make sure that all children, whatever their background, are able to make the most of the opportunities available to them.  We had three main goals when exploring how ethnic minority visitors feel about museums.  First, we were interested in whether we could identify areas for change so that museums can increase the number of ethnic minority visitors and increase their community engagement.  Second, we aimed to help families feel included within the museum community where they may have previously felt excluded.  Finally, we aimed to help children from all families access and benefit from the exciting educational tools museums have to offer.

Now I’ve completed my Masters course, my PhD will now focus more deeply on the role that museums play in promoting language learning opportunities within minority populations.  We will work closely with the Manchester Museum and a local primary school to explore how museums might be used to support children from minority backgrounds in learning new words when compared to a typical classroom setting.  We will also look at whether and how the language used by teachers when delivering taught sessions differs between the classroom and museum settings, and what impact this might have on children’s learning.

Over the coming months we will begin work on the first of the PhD studies.  We will be bringing children to the museum to learn new words through tasks which make the most of the museum’s extensive resources and comparing this to similar tasks in the classroom.  We look forward to reporting the findings of the studies over the next few years, and we hope they will be helpful to both educators and the museum community in understanding how best to support children’s learning.

Find out more about our work in The University of Manchester Child Study Centre or sign up to take part in one of our studies here.

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