Workshops on writing: I love to write, and want others to love writing as well. Writing is a critical communication skill in everyday museum work—such as labels, proposals, reports, publicity, curricula—and when sharing ideas with colleagues through blog entries and articles.
The act of writing also helps to clarify thinking. I’ve conducted writing workshops for the New England Museum Association, Historic New England, Bank Street College of Education, and the Massachusetts History Conference.
Check out this webinar, “Write to Publish,” that I gave for a Lunch With NEMA event in 2016. I was also part of a broader webinar panel, “How Do I get Published? A Practical Guide for Museum Educators,” that I did for the National Art Education Association. I conduct a workshop on label writing every year for the Tufts Museum Studies Course, HIST 0215 Exhibition Planning.
Exhibitions: Exhibition planning is fun, creative, and maddening work. I’ve been lucky to have had the opportunity to create my own exhibitions and to work on teams led by others.
While at The Bostonian Society, I curated three exhibitions:
- Where in the World Does Boston Come From? This exhibition explored how Boston took shape over time, borrowing and transforming architectural styles from other places in the world. The city’s buildings and streetscapes reveal how ideas—about democracy, civic values, and cultural traditions—are embedded in the built environment, 2002.
- The Price of Freedom: Anthony Burns and the Fugitive Slave Act, a traveling exhibition about a free man arrested in Boston in 1850, found guilty in 1854, and sent back into slavery. Installed at the Moakley Federal Courthouse and Suffolk University, 2002 -2003.
- The Boston Massacre, a six-minute permanent sound-and-light exhibition, about the event of 1770 that took place right outside the Old State House Museum, 2001.
I’ve worked on a number of exhibition design teams as an interpretive specialist, researcher, and label writer including outdoor interpretive panels for the Nahant Life Saving Station (with Lynn Spencer), 2014 and the outdoor interpretative panels for a history trail at Fruitlands Museums in 2001. I wrote labels for Theaters of Boston, an exhibition at Emerson College’s Paramount Center, 2009-10 (with Will Twombley); researched, selected images, developed the storyline, and wrote text for exhibitions at Mass General Hospital (with Cambridge Seven Associates and Museum Design Associates) 2007-10: and for all exhibits at the American National Fish and Wildlife Living Museum and Aquarium in Springfield, Missouri (with Cambridge Seven Associates) in 2000.
I also served as project director for the development of Why Concord?, a permanent exhibition at the Concord Museum that opened in 1998 and closed in 2017.
Curricula and Teacher Professional Development: I’ve worked with teachers throughout my career to make museum resources more accessible through curriculum guides and opportunities to work with experts. Projects include:
- Lexington in 1775, 6 lessons using primary sources designed for classroom use by Lexington’s 3rd graders, 2004.
- Enterprising Women: 250 Years of American Business Teacher’s Guide (Lexington: National Heritage Museum 2003). Three units for grades 3 – 6 to accompany a traveling exhibition.
- “Colonial Life and the American Revolution: Bringing the Past to Life in the Classroom.” Twelve-class teacher institute, National Heritage Museum, 2003.
- “The Lure of the West.” Five-day summer teacher institute, National Heritage Museum, 2004.
- Instructor, “Using Local Resources to Teach Social Studies.” Five-session course for primary teachers, Acton Public Schools, 1997.
- Abolition in Lynn (Lynn Historical Society, 1996). Curriculum unit for 11th and 12th grades.
“The professor is obviously a leader in her field, an academic thinker, an excellent facilitator, and understands her own weaknesses. This creates an open, honest, and safe environment. Her propensity to urge my colleagues and I to dig deeper for richer reflection or to critically analyze aspects of educational theory, to me, helped achieve the class’ purpose.”
~Student in Teaching and Learning in the Museum 2016