Valley Head Students Learn From Museum of Literature Project

by Cindy Harrison, English Teacher

The group’s assignment is to work as curators to create a museum exhibit for a novel that they chose to read on their own. In doing this, the students must consider what design would work best to convey their ideas of what the novel represents. The museum can be visually oriented, so that the viewer wanders from object to object; interactive, so that viewers can play with media or computer programs in which the visitor engages in activities that recreate particular episodes; or presentations known as “living museums,” communities that recreate particular places and are filled with actors and sights that make the tourist feel he is transported to another era. Each group must create an invitation to the opening of the museum, a brochure, a book jacket, an art piece, a time capsule from the timeline of the setting, a complete scene from the novel, a poem or ode, a commercial promoting the novel, a one-page tri-fold with themes and symbols, a newspaper, and a gift shop. The students have two months to complete the assignment and have different deadlines for each part of the project. This is a stressful but rewarding educational experience for the students.