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“It was all good. You know, sitting down, having a bite to eat with people I've never met before, you know, and then talking with them in the group, and, obviously bouncing the ideas off of each other and kind of picking out stuff from other people...it’s a shared experience.”- Participant
This project looked at how museums are experienced by adults with unmet literacy needs. The Museum of Literature Ireland (MoLI) and City of Dublin ETB identified good practices and made recommendations as to how museums can become welcoming adult learning spaces.
This project took place in the MoLI Museum between September and December 2024.
10 learners visited the MoLI four times, with the aim of giving feedback about their experience.
Learners attended four storytelling workshops as part of each visit to the museum. Learners used workshops to talk about their learning journeys and to give feedback about their experience in the MoLI.
MoLI tour guides, curators, volunteers, and community outreach staff attended literacy awareness training as part of their staff training day.
Learner feedback alerted MoLI tour guides to the potential of museums as inclusive spaces for adult learners.
Literacy awareness training helped museum staff understand how adults with unmet literacy needs experience the world. It also made staff think of ways museums can be more inclusive when conducting tours and curating exhibitions.
The project culminated in the production of a short information documentary. It contains recommendations on how museums and other cultural spaces can accommodate people with literacy needs.
Creators will share the documentary with other museums and heritage organisations, like the Irish Museums Association.
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This project was a collaboration between City of Dublin ETB (South Inner City Adult Education Service) and Museum of Literature Ireland.
For more information about the project, please contact Andrew Connolly, CDETB Regional Literacy Coordinator at andrew.connolly@aes.cdetb.ie
The Adult Literacy for Life Collaboration and Innovation Fund
The Collaboration and Innovation Fund supports projects for adults with unmet literacy, numeracy and digital literacy needs and projects that support organisations to be literacy friendly. The closing date for 2024 applications has now passed but keep an eye out for information on our 2025 fund which will be launched in December.
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