8 February 2018

Roaming around the Riverina is an exhibition curated by the OC Class from Sturt Public School, and it is currently on show at the Museum of the Riverina. It is an exhibition of photos and artworks that explore the rich and varied history of the Riverina through the perspective of thirty years 5 and 6 school children.

The exhibition was a way to explore the idea of co-curating an exhibition with school kids. While the exhibition appears simple, it took quite a bit of background research and scaffolding to make it all happen. It also allowed us to explore the possibilities of co-curating an exhibition.

The basic idea was to approach a school group and ask for help in curating an exhibition, to build the skills of the children in undertaking public history research and writing and then to see what happened. The only restriction was that their topic needed an image to display, they could find the information, and it related to the history of the Riverina area. Beyond this, the students had free choice for their topics.

Each student was responsible for curating their own frame. They selected up to three images and designed the layout of the frame. They also titled their frame and wrote a label. The results were surprising and very interesting. They picked an amazing array of topics to work through, including the Queen’s 1954 visit to Wagga, money, haunted houses, the gold rush and ancient megafauna.

The key learnings from this project for the museum were:

• Don't assume interests will be typical and don't underestimate their abilities.
• If there is a task that must be completed by a certain time, build in an accountability measure. For example, we had a single step that required the children to find an image and draft a label. Finding an image required them to contact the museum or search the archives. We should have made this two steps rather than one so that we could have supported them better through the research stage.
• Encourage them to be themselves and write in their own voice. An exhibition curated by children that looks and sounds like it was curated by adults defeats the purpose of the co-curation model. Proof grammar, structure and other aspects, as you would as a lead curator, but don't replace their voice with your own.

The exhibition opened on February 6 and closes on 29 April 2018. It also officially launches our next project: STEAM the Museum.

Some of the photos from the launch, taken by Brett Kochel from Wagga Wagga City Council.

The junior curators pose with their teacher, museum staff and the mayor at the opening.

Imi shows Mayor Conkey the frame she curated.

Sameen, Eleanor and Raya with the frames they curated. Together, they curated a story about the drought and floods at Lake Albert in 2010.