I wonder if there are any established educational packages (e.g. ready-made digital learning packs, web-based resources) suitable for pupils aged 12-18 who are learning Mandarin Chinese language, regarding the Chinese collections you have at your museum/gallery or museum/gallery you know of? If so, could you please let me know the links to them? Secondly, I would like to propose a museum/school collaboration project and am looking for a museum who's willing to take part.

 

I am a Chinese teacher at a secondary school based on the Wirral (north west England). Prior to the school closure, I was planning to take some of my pupils to visit the Lady Lever Art Gallery (which is local to my school) as I believe the Chinese-themed displays there certainly will enrich my pupils' learning experiences. Now that the museum visit had to be cancelled/postponed due to the virus situation, I would like to set exciting work/projects for my students to work on. I am trying to find museum resources accessible for my home-bound pupils, in particular, ready-made digital learning packs/worksheets or web-based resources suitable for children aged 12-18, all English speakers. (In the future when the schools are re-opened, I might be looking to continue with my plan of museum visits.) But I did not find many suitable ones- many are for primary school students. Could you please point me to the right direction?

In long term, I am looking to pilot a project and possibly extend it (if the situation allows), regarding the collaboration between you as a museum (perhaps within reasonable travel distance/arrangement from my school) with relevant collections to my subject and classroom teaching/learning. Here are some of the ideas I currently have, but I am open to ideas/suggestions from you.

1. object/replica handling in the museum/gallery then students to create dialogues/drama (in classroom or museum/gallery) based on the objects handled and key Chinese vocab/topics pupils are currently learning.

2. museum staff come to the classroom with a loan box. Objects in the box are relevant to key vocab/topics. I am sure there are a lot of ways to make an object relevant to GCSE/Pre-U Chinese specifications.

3. my pupils to examine (either digitally or on-site in front of the display cabinets) museum collections (relevant to Chinese subject) to produce educational packs (on Chinese subjects, AQA GCSE and Pre-U Chinese specifications) for the host museum. This one can be a long term collaboration that lasts for weeks, perhaps one school term, say 6-7 weeks? Under the current social-distancing situation, I wonder if this can be done remotely, as many museums have online collection database.

4. your ideas/suggestions.

I would be grateful if you can let me know the costs for the above activities, so I can discuss with my budget holder before I can proceed further.  

Is any of these something you would be interested in? Please let me know what you think. Thank you very much in advance.

Yours faithfully,

YiShan Lu