Page 4 - Barnsley Museums Annual Review 2018-2019

Transforming the Lives of Young People
Over 15,000 young people took part in led activities across our museums last year. They explored, discovered, learnt, were inspired and created special memories, for them and the people who care for them.
Our family sessions have been as diverse as a cookery club in the Victorian Kitchen at Cannon Hall, sessions with practicing visual artists including virtual reality ceramics to watercolours, craft sessions and wellbeing activities in the beautiful surrounding of Cannon Hall Park and Worsbrough Mill.
Action research has been a priority for
us, to devise an innovative and exciting family offer for our sites. We developed a Forest School Pilot, a series of sessions with a Barnsley based nursery to explore nature and creativity at Cannon Hall park. We have now offered two drop in Forest School taster days for families with under- fives at Cannon Hall, and a purpose built Forest School area. Working with an artist we have also developed a story telling trail for Worsborough Mill Country Park, which encourages families to create stories whilst taking part in a walk around the reservoir, using nature and their surroundings as inspiration.
The storytelling made the long walk around the mill really interesting. My son is autistic and not many things engage him, but this really did, from start to finish.”
Parent,
Nature Explorers Session
Barnsley Museums have engaged with nearly 2500 primary school pupils across our venues. Pupils have taken part in a range
of workshops covering different aspects of the Curriculum including History, Design and Technology, Art and Design, Science and English. Five bespoke workshops have been created at Cannon Hall, Experience Barnsley and Elsecar Heritage Centre, broadening our core offer to schools across Yorkshire.
Five outreach loan boxes for schools have been created, to be launched in the 2019- 20 academic year. These are bespoke to Barnsley Museums’ sites and each cover a different Curriculum element. This provides a valuable opportunity to connect with disengaged schools through outreach, and gives schools increased options to engage meaningfully with our collections.
Barnsley Museums have also been working to embed Arts Award Discover into our
core programme. Four opportunities for achieving Arts Award have been created across different sites, working with 120 pupils from previously disengaged schools during the pilot project, building and strengthening relationships for the future.