The Franklin Institute

     This week, our class visited the Franklin Institute, and we were given a tour of the new electricity exhibit. Like other museums we have visited, the Franklin Institute's primary goal is education. Unlike other museums, however, the Franklin Institute is an experiential museum, such that the goal of education is achieved through the method of entertainment. The Academy of Natural Science had some interactive exhibits, but nothing quite on the scale that the Franklin Institute uses. The electricity exhibit, while not being especially large, managed to pack in a variety of displays. These displays included both static displays (like artifacts once owned by Ben Franklin in a glass case) and hands-on, "dynamic" displays. The hands-on displays were varied, and included a key which gave visitors a static jolt, e-books on touch screens, and even some video games. Each piece of the exhibit had a lesson to teach, even the most seemingly pointless ones. The displays were fun and they all effectively held a visitor's attention, which took a great deal of work from all the people working behind the scenes.
     The electricity exhibit proved to be a prime example of the experiential museum. Fun, seemingly extraordinary exhibits served to teach lessons about completely ordinary things. The exhibits taught about lightning, static electricity, magnetism and more in an interactive way. The displays give visitors a certain sense of importance. Visitors are being lead through the exhibit and persuaded to try various experiments, but it is done in a way that makes them feel as though they are aimlessly exploring and adventuring. It's easy to feel a certain sense of self-satisfaction when you use your hands to complete a circuit, give somebody a shock, or cause a wall of lights to flare up and react to you. The Franklin Institute quite effectively teaches visitors while making them feel clever and engaged.
     I think the Franklin Institute did a great job at what it set out to do, that is, to teach and entertain simultaneously. Some of the lessons may have gotten muddled in the fun, however. The exhibits about sustainability struck me as especially odd. They attempted to teach about sustainable energy use and renewable energy with a multiplayer video game. I watched four of my classmates play this game, and I could tell that the lesson hardly sunk in. When experiential museums attempt to teach brief lessons about deep, complex topics such as sustainability, balancing learning and entertainment must get very tricky. Perhaps if the exhibit had been just a bit bigger, it could have better reached its educational goal.